A/N: Hey guys! First off, thank you all so much for all of the feedback and encouragement on this story! I appreciate it so much! I'm glad you are all enjoying it!
I've done A LOT of research and reading up on medical stuff, but I'm not an expert by any means! I'm trying my best to make this make sense, be reasonable, and get the story where I want it to go, so hopefully it's alright!
Disclaimer: I don't own Chicago Fire or it's characters.
Hope y'all enjoy this chapter! Please review and let me know what you think so far! Thanks so much y'all!
Chapter 2:
"Brett! Foster! I need some help over here!!" Casey yelled to the paramedics.
Brett grabbed the jump bag and ran to an unconscious Severide's side. She knelt next to him and got to work.
"BP is 80/50 and dropping. Casey, help me get his gear off!" Casey started working on getting Severide's turnout coat and pants off. Brett lifted his shirt and gasped at the dark bruises that littered his abdomen. "He must be bleeding internally. Feels like he's got a couple broken ribs too, and I think he's got some smoke inhalation."
She checked to see if he was breathing. "He's not breathing we need to intubate."
Foster was kneeling on Severide's other side and grabbed all the equipment they'd need. She started the IV as Brett started the intubation.
"We have to get some fluids in him. His BP is too low. Here, Casey, hold this." Foster gave him the IV bag to hold above Severide.
"Hey, Otis! Grab the backboard!" Brett called out, "We have to get him to Med."
As Brett slid the tube down Severide's throat, Casey winced. Brett used the stethoscope to listen to his chest. "I'm in."
They finished up what they were doing and carefully transferred him to the backboard, onto the stretcher, and into the ambulance.
"He stable for now, but he's losing a lot of blood internally. We have to go." Brett said.
Casey looked at Boden who nodded at him. "Casey, ride with them. We'll give you an escort."
Casey jumped in the back with Brett and they rushed to Chicago Med.
On the ride there, they discovered Severide also had a deep gash in his leg that was bleeding. Casey helped pack it to try and stop the bleeding.
Finally after what seemed like forever, they pulled into Chicago Med.
They pushed the stretcher through the emergency room doors, where Dr. Halstead was already waiting, as Boden had radioed ahead to let Med know they were coming.
"What's going on?" He asked.
Brett answered, "He's got broken ribs, smoke inhalation, we had to intubate because he wasn't breathing. Suspected internal bleeding in the abdomen. His BP was 80/50 and dropping, but we've stabilized it for now with fluids. A deep gash in his leg was bleeding but we packed it."
When Brett stopped talking Casey added, "He also dislocated his shoulder, but he popped it back in on scene. He still could barely move it after popping it back in, so it's something to look at."
Halstead had been checking Severide's pulse and blood pressure. He spoke to the nurses, "His BP is dropping and his pulse is weak but rapid. He's going into hypovolemic shock. Call Dr. Rhodes and get him to the OR." He gave the nurses some orders on how to help Severide and then nodded at Brett and Casey, "We'll take care of him the best we can, guys. I promise."
Halstead and the nurses rushed Severide away as the rest of Firehouse 51 spilled through the doors.
They all went into the waiting room and sat down. Casey went to sit down but noticed the blood on his hands. Severide's blood. His best friend.
He rushed out of the waiting room and towards the bathroom.
Cruz found Casey in the bathroom a few minutes later, splashing water on his face, his hands red and raw from trying to scrub all of Severide's blood off.
He came up and put his hand on Casey's shoulder.
Casey looked towards Cruz, and Cruz could see that Casey had tears in his eyes.
"You know, Severide is tough. He's gonna be okay, Casey." Cruz tried to comfort him.
"It's bad, Cruz." Casey choked out, just above a whisper, looking down at his hands.
"Hey, look at me." He waited for Casey to look into his eyes. "We have to believe that he's going to be okay. Herrmann called Chaplain Orlovsky, he'll be here soon." Casey nodded at him as he continued, "We'll have a fundraiser at Molly's for him. And we'll all be here as he recovers. You're his best friend, he's going to need you most of all."
"You're right. Thanks, Cruz."
"Anytime, Casey," he said.
They got back to the waiting room and Boden approached Casey. "I'm assuming you don't know anything more than what Brett determined on scene." Boden said.
"He was going to into shock from blood loss when Halstead and the nurses took him to the OR." Casey replied, starting to pace back and forth.
Boden stood there for a second looking at Casey pacing, and when Casey noticed he was still standing next to him he said, "what?"
"We need to call Kidd." Boden said reluctantly.
Casey's face fell. "I completely forgot about Kidd." He sighed and rubbed his face, "I'll call her."
"You sure?"
Casey nodded, pulled out his phone, and dialed her number as he stepped outside.
It went straight to voicemail and Casey debated on whether he should leave her a message or not. He decided not. He wanted her to hear it from him, not in a voicemail.
He sat outside for a short while, trying to call her every couple of minutes but getting her voicemail every time. He was starting to worry about her.
Eventually Boden came out to see what was going on.
"News??" Casey asked urgently.
"No. No, nothing so far. Just came to see if you got Kidd?"
"Not yet. I'm going to try her a few more times and then I'll come back inside."
"Sounds good. Thanks for calling her."
Casey gave Boden a nod while he dialed Kidd's number again.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Stella Kidd left her doctors office, still in shock from what he had told her.
She pulled her phone out of her pocket and pressed the on button. She saw way too many missed calls from Casey, and suddenly, her situation was pushed to the back burner. Something was up with someone from the firehouse.
She dialed Casey's number and waited for him to pick up. By the time he did, her eyes were already prematurely filled with tears.
"Kidd. I hate to be blunt, but you need to get to Med." Casey said in place of a greeting.
"Who is it?" Kidd asked. In the pit of her stomach, she knew the answer. But she needed to hear him say it. She didn't want him to say it, but at the same time, she knew she needed to hear it for it to be real.
"It's Severide—" he paused for a second before adding, "and it's bad."
That's all she needed to hear for the floodgates to open. "I'll… I'll be there soon." She choked out between sobs.
She didn't tell him that she was already at Med. She headed towards the waiting room. She needed to get to Severide now.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Just minutes after Casey got off the phone with Kidd, she walked into the waiting room and rushed over to him.
"Casey! How bad is it?!" Casey looked around at the rest of the guys, who were watching him. Kidd continued, "Please, Matt, just tell me."
Casey took a deep breath and explained what had happened to Severide. When he got done explaining the extent of Severide's injuries, Kidd got up and rushed out to the bathroom, holding her hand over her mouth.
Boden stood to follow her, but Casey told him he had it.
He knocked on the bathroom door, where he heard someone throwing up. "Kidd? You okay?"
She finished and opened the door. "No, I'm not okay," she told him, tears flowing down her cheeks.
"I know. Me either." They started walking back to the waiting room when Casey spoke up, trying to be encouraging like Cruz was for him, "Severide's tough. You know he'll fight to get back to us."
Kidd stopped walking, looked at Casey and smiled, "I know he will, but…" tears filled her eyes, "what if his body can't bounce back. His injuries sound bad, Casey."
Casey couldn't lie to her, "they are bad, Kidd. But he's going to fight to come back to you… to us. He has to."
Kidd shook her head. "I'm scared. I'm scared he's not going to make it. And I haven't even talked to him the past couple of days. What if he doesn't make it, and the last time we had talked had been in an argument. It was just a small one, but still. What if he never knows…" Kidd's voice trailed off.
"He knows you love him, Kidd, and he loves you too. A lot. Just because you got in an argument—"
"That's not it." She briefly paused before blurting out, "I'm pregnant, Matt. It's Kelly's."
Matt felt a flood of emotions come over him. Surprise. Joy. Excitement. Then he remembered where he was. In a hospital. Waiting on news about his best friend, who was seriously injured, and his heart shattered into a million pieces. Severide was going to be a daddy. But what if he never got to meet his little one?
Casey gave Kidd a hug. "Hey, that's amazing! Just another reason for Severide to fight to come back to us."
Kidd nodded. "I know. But I don't want to tell everyone yet. I'm actually already around 20 weeks along. I didn't know I was pregnant. I started having some weird symptoms a couple months ago, but I just found out this morning. That's how I got here so fast. I was already here for an appointment."
Casey just nodded. "We'll make sure Severide knows, but we don't have to tell everyone else yet if that's what you want. It would be good to have their support eventually though."
"Yeah, I know. I just need time to process everything. Thank you, Casey."
"Of course, Kidd. I'll be here for you and Severide, and the baby, always."
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Back in the waiting room, everyone was concerned about Kidd, but she brushed it off. She settled down for a long and agonizing wait.
After a couple hours, still with no news, Cindy and Donna brought food for everyone. Another hour went by and the food remained mostly untouched. Cindy and Donna hounded everyone until they at least drank something.
Everyone had mostly just been sitting, being left to their own thoughts. Kidd had gone from sitting to pacing, back to sitting, all with tears almost constantly flowing down her cheeks. Brett and Foster tried to comfort her, but it wasn't doing much good.
Casey was also restless like Kidd. He couldn't stop himself from pacing. Severide is his best friend. He has to be okay. Casey didn't know if he could keep going without Severide. He had been there for Casey through thick and thin. They were each other's ride or die.
He thought back to a couple weeks ago when they were on shift, Severide brought a couple cigars to his office and asked him to come outside and talk. Casey agreed. While they were talking Severide brought up Kidd…
"You know… I really love Stella, Matt." Severide had said.
Matt laughed out loud, "I think everyone in this house knows that, Kelly. It's like you two were made for each other."
Severide just smiled. Then he pulled a small box out of his pocket. "Check this out." He opened the box to show Casey a gorgeous ring. "I'm going to ask her to marry me. I might wait a few more months, but last week I wandered into a jewelry store and was planning on just looking. Then I saw this and knew it was perfect for Stella, so I had to get it. Now I just have to plan how I'm going to pop the question."
Casey was grinning from ear to ear, "this ring is beautiful, Kelly. I'll help you plan your engagement if you want."
"Of course, Matt! Thanks, buddy."
From there, Severide and Casey started planning. Casey had loved watching Severide get so excited. He was like a kid in a candy store. Now, all that was on hold. Severide was injured badly, practically fighting for his life, and Casey was beating himself up for not getting down to the basement sooner to help Severide.
He collapsed into the chair closest to him, suddenly exhausted. They had just been on the tail end of a 24 hour shift when their lives turned upside down.
Finally, a couple minutes later, Halstead came back into the waiting room, followed by one of the trauma surgeons. The group of firefighters didn't like the expression on their faces. Both of them had a poker face type expression, and the group took that to mean they didn't have good news.
Casey and Kidd quickly stood and rushed to the doctors.
Halstead spoke first, "First of all, Kelly made it through surgery. He is in critical but stable condition." The group wanted to be relieved. He made it through surgery. But that word "critical" stayed in the forefront of their minds.
Halstead continued, "This is Dr. Rhodes. He's one of the best trauma surgeons we have on our staff. He was operating on Kelly, so he's going to tell you more about his injuries."
"Mr. Severide—"
Casey cut him off, "please, just call him Severide or Kelly."
Dr. Rhodes nodded, "Kelly had some moderate smoke inhalation, and a few broken ribs. We stitched up the cut in his leg. Kelly's most serious injury was the internal bleeding in his abdomen. We had to operate to find the bleed and stop it. We did that successfully and he is receiving blood transfusions and fluids now."
The whole group in the waiting room almost visibly relaxed before Dr. Rhodes started talking again, "We have put him in a medically-induced coma and on a ventilator in the ICU. This is to help his body recover from the severe injuries he has, over the next few days. It's important that you know that these types of injuries have a very high risk of infection and complications within the next few weeks. The first 72 hours after surgery are the most critical."
"We also need to do some tests to determine the extent of the damage to his shoulder. We haven't done any yet because of the fact that he's still very critical." Halstead added.
"Can we see him?" Kidd asked.
"Usually we would only allow one at a time, but I can let two of you come to see him now, and then one of you can sit with him."
Boden nodded at Kidd and Casey when they turned and looked at him.
"If you follow me, I'll take you to him. The nurses should be just about finished getting him situated." Halstead told them.
"Thank you, Dr. Halstead and Dr. Rhodes." Boden said, shaking the doctors hands.
Casey and Kidd followed Halstead to Severide's room.
Before they went in Halstead stopped them in the hall. "I know Dr. Rhodes told you guys what to expect, but I need to be honest with you because I know how close you both are to Kelly. These types of injuries have very high risks for complications and infections. I've rarely ever seen a patient not have some sort of complication after having these types of injuries. I'm worried that Kelly having these injuries combined are taking a toll on his body and if he gets an infection it's not going to be good. I just want you to be aware of how critical he is."
Casey spoke up, "Severide is a fighter, Will."
"I know, Casey. I'm just trying to be realistic. Hopefully keeping him in a medically-induced coma for a few days will give his body time to recover from the trauma. I'll leave you guys alone to go see him for a few minutes. Talk to him. Even if you don't think he can hear you."
"Thanks," Casey said.
Casey let Kidd enter Severide's room first, and her breath hitched when she saw him laying motionless and vulnerable in the hospital bed. The daddy of the little baby she was growing in her stomach. Her heart broke at the possibility of Kelly not being here to watch their baby grow up.
Kelly's skin was pale, even against the crisp, white hospital sheets. Tears filled her eyes as she took in the IV that was pumping blood into him and the ventilator that was breathing for him.
She walked over to the side of the bed and grabbed his hand as Casey stood on the other side and grabbed his other hand.
"Hey, buddy. Me and Kidd are here." He looked at Kidd.
"Hey, Kelly," she rested her other hand on her stomach, although she was barely showing. "We need you to fight this. Me and Casey, and all the guys at the firehouse. We need you." She paused, looking at Casey and smiling, before looking back at Severide, "and our baby, Kelly. Our baby needs you. I found out this morning that I'm pregnant. So I need you to fight and come back to us. Our baby needs their daddy."
"We'll take care of Kidd until you get through this, but you have to do your part and fight. We're holding you to it."
Casey added.
A few minutes later, Halstead came back to tell them that Kelly really needed to rest.
"Do you want me to stay with him tonight?" Casey asked Kidd.
"No, I'm okay. You go get some rest, you were on shift, I'm sure you're exhausted."
"Thanks, Kidd. Let me know if anything changes."
Casey went back out to the waiting room and told everyone that Severide was okay, Kidd was staying, and everyone needed to go home and get some sleep. They all headed out.
As Casey started to drive away, he decided to grab a bite to eat. Then he thought about Kidd. She hadn't even touched any of the food Cindy and Donna had brought. He knew she needed to eat, if not for herself then for the baby.
He got himself some food and got something to take back to the hospital for Kidd.
When he walked back into Severide's room, Kidd was sitting in the chair next to his bed, holding his hand and leaned over laying her head on Severide's arm. Her eyes were closed, but she opened them when she heard Casey walk in.
"Hey. I figured you might need something to eat."
"I'm not really hungry—"
"Kidd. You know you need to eat for the baby. At least a little bit. You need to stay healthy for the baby and for Severide. He would never forgive me if something happened to you."
Kidd just smiled at him, "you're right. I'll eat something. Thanks for bringing this, Casey. I really appreciate you always being here for Kelly and me."
"Of course, Kidd. I'll be back tomorrow."
Casey left the room, but he couldn't bring himself to leave the hospital. He went back to the waiting room and settled in. He wasn't comfortable leaving the hospital with Severide in such critical condition. He had to be here, just in case something happened.
So, he settled in, hoping and praying for a quiet night.
Is Severide actually out of the woods? You'll have to wait and see! *evil laugh* I can't help it, I love cliffhangers y'all! Thanks so much for sticking with me! Hope you are enjoying so far!!
