Disclaimer: I don't own the TMNT

A/N: Yes! I'm back after a long absence. I've had some medical difficulties of my own. Luckily they haven't effected my baby in the slightest, I'm in the 2nd tri and she's a girl. This is one story that I definetly won't give up so you don't have to worry about that. There's more boring medical mumbo jumbo in here (tee hee hee!) so suck it up! Hope you enjoy the chapter.

Chapter 8

Triage Continued

The family of mutants looked at me quizically at my request for blood type.

Leo stepped forward. "We don't know what our blood type is, or even, being what we are, if we even have a blood type. Why are you asking? Does Donny need blood!"

Splinter was fretting more than I thought possible, his frail looking hand was trembling as it rested on Donatello's forehead. "If he is still bleeding, is there a way to stop it? I remember you telling us of being a medic, perhaps you know a way."

I shifted my weight on my crutch, my one leg complaining of being in one position for so long. "Well the thing is...I don't know. Part of it has to do with what you are."

Leonardo stepped closer to me, looking slightly offended and angry. "What do you mean what we are?"

I took a breath. Don't want to get him upset. Calm down. I let the breath out and continued, switching to the somewhat detatched 'doc' mode. "You see, one of my biggest worries is his abdomen and chest. There is no exit wound for the bullet so I don't know where it's lodged. When I said because of what you are, I am talking about you anatomy and who you are. Anatomy wise: with a human, on many occasions you can tell if they're bleeding internally by looking at them. A bruise will form on their chest, or whatever area of skin it's located in. Not only do you have more leathery, darker skin, but your entire chest, abdomen, and pelvis is either covered by a shell or plastron. Secondly, who you are. It's not like I can take him to the hospital and get him x-rayed to see where the bullet is and if it's causing any more damage for obvious reasons. I didn't mean to offend you if I did."

Apparently I got the realities of the situation through and he nodded. "Well, we know someone who might have some type of x-ray."

This caught my attention. "Who?"

"He's a mutant crocodile named Leatherhead. Both he and Donny were into technical stuff, but I guess you could say that LH was more into it than Donny was. Especially after he was experimented on by the government, you could say that it sparked his interest even more."

I clapped my hands. "Good. Do I have any volunteers to see him?"

Mikey raised his hand. "Alright. See if he has any type of x-ray or ultrasound or any type of imaging device that may be of use to us. If it isn't portable see if he has a stretcher, otherwise we'll just have to construct one here. Just describe the situation and ask if he has any other type of medical equipment that we could possibly use, especially with the impaled object. I want to know what will happen if we pull it out."

He sped off like his tail was on fire. I turned to the others. "Now, to answer your other question: yes, I really believe that he needs blood. See how pale his gums are?" I lifted Don's lip to show them. "Yeah, they shouldn't be that pale. But since you don't even know if you have blood types, I don't want to risk any type of transfusion. That could kill him quicker than lack of blood would. What we'll use instead in the meantime is IV fluids and rest. Once he is able to eat, get some proteins and irons into him to help him build back his blood supply. He needs plenty of rest. I don't know how much blood he lost, so I don't want him to lose any more. I don't know how much more he needs to lose to kill him. For this reason among others I'm leaving the bar in his leg. If it did sever an artery, it's not showing on the skin yet. With most impaled objects like that as long as it's in it actually hinders the leakage which is a good thing, because I don't know how to stop it at this point."

Splinter looked at me. "What do you mean you don't know how to stop it? You are medical."

I shook my head, rubbing my hand through my hair in frustration. "I'm not trained in everything. Half the stuff that I just did I'm not allowed to do, doctors are supposed to do it. I just learned how because there isn't always a doctor handy in the middle of a battlefield. Technically that bar is a surgeon's job but obviously we won't have one at our disposal any time soon. Now, to start that IV."

I searched through the medical kit for an IV. He had six. All the IV's were visibly old, but they were still in their sterile packages so they would work. A 20g, three 18g and two 16g. Since the sixteen was the biggest one there and he had two of them, I started with that one. Using the cut off large rubber band, I tightened a turniquiet on his upper forearm. I rubbed the skin to heat it up, dipping it below the table and slapping the skin at the same time. His veins were being stubborn. The lack of blood and probably dehydration wasn't going to make this easy.

Feeling my leg cramping in the squatted position I swallowed my pride and called Leo over to help support me. It's hard to squat with only one leg. Unwrapping the IV and a heplock, I gave the heplock to Leo to hold for a moment and held the IV at ready, bevel up. I could feel a vein on the underside of his forearm and it was straight enough that I was going to go for it. I slid the needle under his skin and watched for the flash of blood. There was none. Slowly I pulled it out a bit, though not enough to take the needle out. Choosing a different direction I felt for the vein as I fished it in the new direction. A flash of red appeared at the hilt of the IV. Not wanting to damage the vein, I kept the needle where it was and, applying pressure over the site to stop blood spilling I slowly threaded the IV catheter in the vein without the needle. It glided in smoothly. Snatching the heplock I screwed it over the tiny hub until it was secure. Releasing my pressure and the turniquet I inspected the site. It looked good.

Selecting some tape I secured the IV with three thin strands in the 'football' style before selecting some tegaderm to give it extra hold. After that I asked to see the IV bags. To my dismay every single one of them was expired but in this case beggars can't be choosers. At least none of them were expired for more than a year. Looking at all the plastic bags full of clear fluid, I selected one that would befit my needs for now. It's not like the choices were plentiful. It was a bag of regular D5LR. For those of you non-medical folks, D5 stands for dextrose. Yep. You guessed it, sugar. He needs to keep his levels up anyway since there is sugar in every cell, and he lost a lot of blood cells. LR stands for lactated ringers, which is basically electrolytes broken down into laymen's terms. That's right, electrolytes are in gatorade and other such drinks. Basically it's good for you. Will help keep the energy up and such.

He had plenty of unopened bags of IV tubing, I just selected one. I connected it with the bag. Leo managed to find a coathanger looking thing that we could use as an IV pole. The only real important thing anyway was that it was higher than him. By using the clamp, I adjusted the IV drip rate. I didn't want it to be too fast and flood his system. I monitored the IV site for a moment, palpating it with my fingers to make sure it wasn't infiltrating, (IV fluid going somewhere other than the vein). I could feel the coolness of the fluid trailing up his arm and the IV hub was clear. It was running in good.

Then the elevator door opened and immediately the two beside me whipped around, weapons at ready. They immediately relaxed when April stepped through. "Sorry it took so long for me to get here, guys. The police kept me over asking questions about how Don got my pass card. I finally convinced them that it was stolen."

Leo stepped forward to walk with her. "Did you find out what happened to Donny?"

She nodded. "He caught the attention of a security guard. I guess you know how Don is when he gets a hold of new 'toys' for a project. Then he apparently jumped out of the window to escape but the bullet found him along the way. It wasn't a first story window either." She closed her eyes for a moment and took a deep breath."How is he? Can I see him?"

They led her over to him and quickly she assessed him over. Her face was pale but she gave me a shaky smile. "You did great. I'm glad that you were here. These guys are very special to me."

"We're waiting for their friend, uh Leather...?"

"Leatherhead."

"Yeah, to see if he has any equipment that would allow us to see one: where the bullet is lodged and two: what the reebar in his leg is hindering."

She looked him over again and nodded. I looked at her. In a way, she looked so much like my Emily. Emily always looked innocent. Then again, appearances could be decieving. I found that out when I came back from the war.

She startled me with her next question. "Is there anything that you think you'd need that's not here? I might be able to get it."

I shrugged. "Not sure. Most the stuff he needs isn't exactly within everyday public's reach."

I looked at Donatello. He stirred slightly in his sleep but didn't wake up. It was too bad that he couldn't get the best of care, the best of equipment. Society could be so cruel sometimes. I shifted my weight from one crutch to the other. My good leg was stiffening up. How long have I been standing? Probably too long. I'd better go sit down.

I was just finding my seat as I heard the elevator open and saw their friend. My eyes widened. They weren't joking! That guy is huge. Simply put. He was much more massive muscular-wise than any of the other humans. His heavy tail probably weighed as much as me. Pointed claws tipped each of his fingers and bony ridges jutted down his back.He spotted me and smiled. Pointy teeth poked out of his mouth. I couldn't resist the tremor that went through me. Great. Here I was pitying the judgemental humans and here I was doing the same thing!

"My friends, I was hoping I could be of assistance."

Well, at least he sounded friendly.

A/N: Ending this chapter has been making me tear my hair out. Next chapter will get some more things moving. I will go through part of what went on in 'past explanations'and go onto what I'm getting into with the plot. Hopefully, at least. This story never had a solid plot to begin with but it will end soon after the showdown between Emily and Joe.

Toodles!