So, I hope everyone is still enjoying this story. Thanks to all my readers for their continued support!
I have good news and bad news: The good news: This story is nowhere near finished. yay! Bad News: I will be out of the country on vacation so I'll update in about 3 weeks.
Enjoy!
Remember: House just crashed his motorcycle coming into work.
Chapter 47:
"I can take you home. It's no problem."
Princeton General Hospital ambulance driver and EMT Bernard Shawman, was speaking to the woman sitting beside him as he drove the ambulance along Route 27 in Princeton.
The woman sitting in the passenger seat, who was his EMT rotational partner for the particular shift, swung her long black hair off her shoulder, as she looked out the side window and yawned. "Alright," she finally decided, "We're done with our shift anyway. I hate these 'crack of dawn' shifts."
The two EMT's had just finished the late night 'graveyard' shift, as one may call it, with their last call an hour or so after sunrise. Currently, they were headed back to Princeton General's ambulance bay, after picking up some breakfast once their shift ended.
Suddenly, the woman in the passenger seat sat up and peered carefully out the window. "Bernie, stop!" she said abruptly to the driver. She pointed out an orange motorcycle on the opposite side of the road, smashed up against the guardrail.
Bernie, the driver, followed her pointed finger and said, "Kate, we're off duty. Have someone else go take a look."
Katherine Cuddy shook her head. "We should at least see if they're okay and stay with them until another ambulance shows up," she reassured him.
Pulling over to the side of the road, Bernie let the vehicle idle as he and Kate climbed out of the ambulance.
Bernie, who was first to reach the smashed motorcycle, exclaimed, "Woah! This bike looks like it went through the scrap yard…is that a cane rack?"
Upon hearing the words 'cane rack', Kate stopped dead in her tracks on the way over to him. "Did you just say the motorcycle had a cane rack on it?" she asked, slowly as her heart began to beat faster in her chest.
"Yea," Bernie called out to her, failing to notice that she had stopped walking, as he was preoccupied with this unrecognizable feature on a modern motorcycle. "Whoever would have thought cripples to ride motorcycles?" he cackled.
Kate didn't even hear what he was saying. Reaching the guardrail, and looking down the hill, she saw a man in a leather jacket faced down in a ditch.
"Shit," she murmured. Without any ounce of hesitation, and ignoring the questionable look on Bernie's face,
Kate leaped over the guardrail and quickly sprinted down the hill towards the ditch as fast as her athletic legs could carry her, her heart hammering violently in her chest.
"I thought we were off duty!" Bernie called down to her as he stood at the shoulder of the road, still comprehending why his partner was rushing to attend to the motorcycle victim.
"Not anymore!" Katherine Cuddy yelled up to him over her shoulder, "Now, don't just stand there! Get a gurney down here!"
As Bernie hastened to obey her instructions, Kate stepped into the ditch, kneeled down beside House's body and slowly turned him over. He was unconscious. As soon as she looked at his left arm dangling at an odd position, she knew it wasn't good.
"Shit, Greg," she murmured.
Immediately, she carefully took off House's helmet, while keeping his neck as still as possible, not knowing of any damage to the spinal cord. Scrapes and dirt covered his face as Kate's eyes scanned down it.
Unzipping his jacket, Kate carefully lifted up his t-shirt and cringed when she saw that part of the left side of his rib cage was turning a light pale purple.
Hearing a noise behind her, Kate turned around to see a gurney, handled by Bernie, coming toward her.
"What's going—" Bernie started to ask.
"Just shut up and come here," Kate told him hurriedly. Once the gurney was lowered beside House's body, very diligently, she and Bernie shifted him onto the gurney.
"Be careful of his left shoulder," Kate warned.
After House was secured on the gurney, Kate grabbed House's helmet and she and Bernie began the treacherous, slow trip back up the hill.
Once the gurney was up the hill and onto the shoulder of the road, Kate loaded it into the back of the ambulance, grabbed House's cane off his bike, and then climbed in the ambulance, while Bernie went over to the driver's side, clambered in and started the vehicle, blaring the sirens.
"Go to Princeton Plainsboro, Bernie," Kate told the ambulance driver, as he drove quickly down the main road.
"Why?" Bernie asked, from the front seat. "You know we're going to get in trouble, right? We work for Princeton General, not PPTH, Kate."
"Just do it," Kate told him, fiercely, as she tore the left arm of House's jacket, stopping at the shoulder. Ripping the jacket carefully off him without further causing any harm and cutting the sleeve of his t-shirt off, Kate finally assessed the damage.
The shoulder was clearly not attached, as it was wrenched out of the socket. The severity of the tear or dislocation, Kate did not know. Deciding to leave that alone for the moment, Kate finished cutting the t-shirt off House's body and carefully felt his ribs.
"Definitely bruised, maybe broken," she murmured to herself.
All of a sudden, House coughed and started to retch, moaning. Kate grabbed a metal container near the ambulance door and moved up to the head of the gurney. Turning House's head in the direction of the basin,
Kate watched as he emptied his stomach contents, half in the basin and half on the ambulance floor. He coughed again.
Without hesitating, Kate put down the half-full basin and grabbed her walkie-talkie, punching in a few numbers.
"Dispatch to Princeton Plainsboro."
She waited two seconds and then continued. "Dispatch, over. This is Princeton General ambulance # 4482.
Bringing a motorcycle victim. About 5 minutes out."
She waited and then heard a female voice come on the line. "Princeton Plainsboro to dispatch. We read you, but shouldn't you be paging your own hospital? Over."
"Special circumstances," Kate spoke into the walkie-talkie. Without waiting for an answer or a refute, she continued. "….victim unconscious. Probable concussion. Bruised ribs. Very probable left shoulder tear."
She paused, and then said quickly, "I know this is against standard protocol but the victim is Gregory House, and dispatch who you are speaking with right now is Katherine Cuddy from Princeton General. Over."
Silence. Bernie looked back at her and then looked down at House, suddenly making the connection.
"Wait, your sis—" he started to say but Kate cut him off.
"Not now, Bernie. Focus on the road." She began speaking into the walkie-talkie before the line had a chance to pick up again. "Dispatch again. Request to tell everyone to keep their mouths shut. Do not spread it around. Do not tell Lisa Cuddy, whatever you do. I repeat, do not tell my sister. When we arrive, permission to know where she is to inform her of the circumstances? Over."
Silence on the other line. Then, "Dispatch, permission granted. ETA?"
"About 4 minutes." Kate laid the walkie-talkie down on the floor of the ambulance, and wiped the side of
House's mouth and when he started to retch, she turned his head again.
"Greg?" she called out to him. "Greg, can you hear me?"
No response. She was sure he was coming around. She tried again.
"Don't move your left arm, okay?" Squeeze my hand if you understand me." Kate grabbed his hand and felt him give her hand a very light squeeze. It was weak, but at least he was responsive. Kate breathed a soft sigh of relief.
Good," she said, relieved, "Good. You're going to be okay." She paused then said, "You're in an ambulance. Are you in any pain?"
Keeping his eyes closed, House nodded. Taking a breath, he immediately regretted it and tensed up, gritting his teeth, and moaned in agony. "My arm…" he whispered. He made a sudden movement to bring his right arm up to grasp his left shoulder, but Kate gently pulled it back, stopping him.
"It's okay. Just relax," Kate spoke softly to him, "You're okay. I need you to stay awake for me, okay?"
"Greg?" she tried again, after a 5 second pause.
Suddenly, House opened his eyes and gripped Kate's hand. Fighting back nausea, he took a few labored breaths before whispering, "Lisa?"
"She's not here," Kate told him, soothingly. "You'll see her soon, I promise. Try not to move, okay?"
As he pulled into the bay of Princeton Plainsboro, Bernie looked at Kate before backing up the ambulance towards the ER doors.
"You do realize Scott is not going to be happy with us, right?" he reminded his colleague, referring to the supervisor of Emergency Medical Services at Princeton General.
Bernie, I hardly think now is the time to be thinking about that, pending the circumstances," Kate told him, while taking House's pulse again.
As House retched and moaned once more, Kate turned his head so that his vomit would go in the basin. As Bernie backed up the ambulance, the doors banged open and Kate looked up to see two attending standing there, ready to assist.
"Careful," Kate told them, as she and the two men wheeled the gurney into the ER. They were met by another attending who looked at Kate, then looked down at House then back up at Kate.
Sensing the man's confusion, Kate said, "I'm her sister."
"Ahh," the attending understood, "what happened?"
Kate and the attending wheeled the occupied gurney into an empty area behind a curtain. Ignoring all the stares around them, Kate yanked the curtain shut and then said, "He was found in a ditch, helmet on, bike crashed into guardrail, must have flipped over handlebars by the looks of it. Left shoulder looks either separated or dislocated, I couldn't tell. Ribs on left side may be bruised, probably not broken. He's been in and out of consciousness the whole ride here…his breathing seems to be labored. That's probably from his injured ribs…"
As he was listening to Kate retell the events of what happened as far as she could tell, the attending examined House's torso and felt around. He stopped as he heard House moan in pain, gritting his teeth in an effort to not yell out..
"House, don't move," the attending told the injured diagnostician. He mentioned for Kate to go on retelling the events of earlier.
"Vomited three times on the way here. Probable concussion. Unknown if it's minor or major. He was in and out of consciousness but semi-responsive."
"He has at least three bruised ribs. They may as well be fractured but they may be hairlines," the attending said as he finished poking around House's torso, as he and a nurse who had just came behind the curtain to assist carefully immobilized House's left shoulder in a makeshift cardboard sling. "I'll have them double check with an X-ray."
"I'll be back in five minutes," Kate told them. "Do not do anything except clean him up." The attending nodded to show he understood the EMT's directions.
Excusing herself, Kate withdrew from behind the curtain and walked in the direction to the nurse's station. She was immediately met by a nurse who informed her, "Ms. Cuddy, your sister is in Board Room F on the third floor."
Kate nodded to show she understood. "Bring a basin there. He's probably going to vomit again," she ordered, and without another glance in the nurse's direction, she continued her brisk pace toward the stairs located outside of the ER.
"This isn't a show, people!" she roared at all the onlookers who were either staring at the curtain, where behind it, House was lying behind on a gurney, or gaping at Kate as she strolled past.
TBC...