………

A few moments later, Morris came flying into sutures.

"Woah!" he exclaimed, "OK, hold still Luka, I'll extubate."

"No rectals, no kids, I said..." Archie muttered to himself as he delicately removed the tube. Luka choked, then deeply inhaled as he sat bolt upright, pushing Morris out of the way.

"Hey, take it easy!" Morris protested, throwing his arms wide. "What the hell happened anyway?" But Morris's questions, like may others in the department, remained unanswered. Luka Limped out to where Abby lay on a trolley. His muscles, which only a few minutes ago had been paralysed, where still not working properly; but it was his heart which had frozen with fear.

"Kerry?" He demanded, his voice hoarse, as he watched the team clip monitors and tubes onto Abby. Staggering slightly, he called to his team.

"Get a foetal heart monitor on her! How much blood did she lose?" Luka's weak and partially paralysed legs gave way beneath him slightly.

"Alright Kovac, take five," Kerry said, pushing him back.

"No," Luka answered, pulling himself up. He couldn't leave her again. If he stayed here and prayed, maybe she would open her eyes.

"Now," Kerry said, "Let us do our job Luka."

Luka took one look back at Abby before slamming through the doors, running a hand through his Croatian mane. The anger swelled in his gut.

How could I have let this happen? He asked himself. Every second of every minute he had stood by Abby, watching her so closely until he had learned her by heart. He'd allowed himself to be distracted temporarily by a stupid marriage proposal and while he hadn't been looking, this had happened. In anger at himself, he pummeled the cement. He balled his fist into the cinder-wall again and again. He did this until the blood poured out of his knuckles. He did this until he could be sure that Abby wasn't the only one hurting.

"Luka!" yelled Pratt, hauling him away from the wall. Greg surveyed the scene around him; shattered were the surroundings that seemed so familiar; shattered was his spirit. In the last few months he had completely fallen out of love with the world, after discovering the world he thought he knew was a complete lie. He thought angrily back to Michael's father, and how parents set their kids up for a life disappointment and empty promises.

"Luka? You ok, man? What happened?" Pratt asked, but before Luka could answer, he looked through the door to the limp form on the table.

"Oh my God…is that Abby?" But Luka didn't need to answer his question.

"Hey…she'll be ok," Greg said, patting Luka on the back, lying, because it was the only thing he knew how to do.

Meanwhile, in the Trauma room…

"How's her pressure doing?" Kerry asked, fixing the oxygen mask around Abby's face.

"Still dropping," Holeh answered, checking one of the bleeping machines which was becoming angrier and louder like a horse changing in pace from a canter to a gallop.

"OK, push the fluids through and get me two more units of O-neg," she called, squinting her eyes and shaking her head. "She's losing blood faster than we can get it in." She took a guilty glance up at Luka who was waiting by the door.

"Pressure's stable," Holeh retorted, unprompted. Kerry looked back up at Luka and smiled with a sigh of relief. Abby was stable. Kerry had saved her, just as Abby had saved Kerry on so many occasions.

"OK, she can go up to OB now. Someone go with her please, and ask them to page me when she wakes up." Kerry through off her gloves into a toxic yellow bin and went to face the rest of the destruction.

"Foetal heart rate is down!" called Holeh above more furious bleeping. Kerry rushed back in.

"What?" Kerry answered. She felt her heart drop. Outside, Luka was feeling a familiar sensation. What was happening? Luka knew the look on the faces of his team; something bad had happened, something unexpected. He could no longer stand by and watch. He stormed through the door, his massiveness almost making the room swell and burst.

"What's going on?" he demanded.

"The baby's heart rate is dropping, it's probably a placental haemorrhage. We need to deliver now; but if we deliver there is a strong risk that Abby's pressure will drop and she'll bleed out. We can only save one of them."

All eyes in the room turned to Luka. He felt the pressure of a thousand litres of water pushing down on him and the realisation hit him like a tsunami.

He had to choose who to save. He had to choose who must die.

(Next part coming up soon! Thanks for all the feedback!)