Adams was sitting at the window, looking at the Seattle traffic going by the cafe nearby Grey-Sloan. He was drinking his coffee and eating his bagel. He was due at work in another 30 minutes. He stood up, getting ready to leave before all of a sudden he heard a crash and his world went black. When he slowly came, he heard sirens in the distance and people yelling outside. He wanted to move. But he couldn't. He was in pain. He tried to look where he was stuck. His legs were pinned under the car.
He could hear a woman screaming in pain somewhere in the cafe. He couldn't help her. He was stuck. He took most of the impact. His phone was right beside his head. It was shattered. He needed to call for help. But they would find him. Hopefully. Then he heard a noise coming from the car. He kept hearing voices. But he couldn't recognize them. His head hurt. He knew he probably had a concussion.
He slipped unconscious again when Travis got to him. "Hey buddy, you have to stay with me here," a voice told him before he slipped under the darkness again. He didn't recognize that voice. It was Amelia or Meredith. Someone he hadn't heard before. Meanwhile, Andy heard Travis say someone was pinned underneath the car over the radio. She looked around for who was available and spotted Jack and Vic. "Gibson, Hughes. Take Montgomery the airbags and help him with the person trapped," she ordered.
They nodded their heads and ran to the truck and grabbed every airbag they had and ran inside. "Warren, I need the medical bag when you're available," he said on the radio. But Ben wasn't available. He was with Theo on another victim, leaving Maya running the bag in. Travis knew that he probably had crush injuries. But he didn't know to what extent since Jack and Vic were still working on getting the airbags in the right place.
"You ready?" Vic asked, poking her head up from where she was on the ground. "Ready when you are," Travis responded. As Jack inflated the airbags, Travis and Maya started to pull. Amid everything, Theo had run over a backboard from one of the aid cars; since theirs was in use by Ben, who was already off to Grey Sloan. They pulled gently. As they got Adams onto the backboard, he was still unconscious.
As he was on the backboard. Theo pointed out something. "Guys, he's in scrubs," he mentioned. He started to look around for some sort of credentials. Maya was on the other side of the car and found something. "He's a doctor at Grey Sloan. His ID says, Lucas Adams. Anyone know him?" she asked. They shook their heads no. "I need two splints," Travis said. Theo ran back to the aid car and grabbed the splints and c-collar. He helped Travis align Lucas's leg and Vic stabilized his neck.
"Let's go, I can do the rest in the aid car," Travis said. They all lifted at the same time. Travis ran ahead to put his fire coat in the truck and put the medical bag in the aid car. He brought the stretcher down. They got Adams onto the stretcher and loaded him into the aid car. Travis cut his scrubs open and attached the leads that connected to the monitor. "Theo, you want to drive?" he asked. "Yeah, I think Herrera won't miss me that much," he chuckled.
As he turned on the monitor. His heartbeat was normal, his pulse was in the lower 90s, and his pulse ox was in the mid-'90s. His heart rate was tachy in the 120s. He knew he had to put in beta blockers, but he didn't have that on him. But he knew that would probably stabilize when they were transported. As he put in the IV, the monitor started to blare. He quickly looked at the monitor and saw that his sat levels were dropping. "Hughes, want to help me here?" he panicked, still administering the IV and hanging it above him.
He moved above Adam's head. "Once I intubate him, do you want to pump the Ambu bag?" he asked, snapping a new pair of gloves on. "Yeah," she said, shedding her fire jacket and climbing in. Theo was in the front seat, waiting for his signal to go. He dug through the medical bag while the alarm was going off. He needed to hurry. He found the ET tube and the laryngoscope. He took off the c-collar and tilted Adams's head back and inserted the laryngoscope; followed by the tube.
Once he checked for bilateral breath sounds, he attached the Ambu bag. The monitor stabilized and everything was back to normal. He handed the bag to Hughes and worked on rechecking his blood pressure. It was normal but lower than normal. So he let it slide for now. There were a lot of small cuts and a larger one on Lucas's forehead. He ripped open some gauze and cleaned it the best he could before taping a large piece on his forehead. He knew that he needed stitches.
"Ok, let's go," he said. Maya closed the doors and patted the back of the ambo, signaling for Theo to take off. He started blaring the lights and speeding off. He radioed ahead to Grey-Sloan and told them that they were on the way with a John Doe. he sped down the Seattle streets. Lights blaring. Travis kept looking at the heart rate. He was still tachy in the 120s. He knew he had nothing to fix it. Then the alarm on the monitor went off.
"Ruiz. How far are we away from Grey-Sloan?" he yelled. "5 minutes," he responded, looking in the rearview mirror. Then the monitor went flat. He started to do chest compressions. "Hughes, I need you to help me. Take over compressions while I get the pads charged. Ruiz; you might need to step on it!" he exclaimed. Once they were charged. He yelled, "CLEAR" Vic stopped chest compressions, and he put the pads on the right spots, and Lucas's back arched up. But there was no change. He did it again. After the 2nd try, he got him back.
Vic returned to the Ambu bag and Travis sat down and breathed. He knew that they were at Grey-Sloan. Ruiz brought the aid car to a stop and got out to find Owen and Link standing there. As Travis opened the doors, he listed off everything they had. As Owen helped get the stretcher down. He realized who it was. "Link, you need to get Amelia and Meredith now," he said. Theo, Travis, and Vic all looked at each other.
"You know him?" Hughes questioned. "He's one of our interns; specifically Amelia and Meredith's nephew," Link told them. "Trauma 1 is open. Let's go," Owen ordered. Montgomery followed them inside and Theo and Vic stayed behind to wait for him and the stretcher. They got Adams onto the hospital bed and then wheeled the stretcher out. Owen started ordering all sorts of things, an X-ray of his chest and right leg and arm; a FAST scan, everything. A nurse had already paged Amelia and Meredith. So they had to be on the way soon.
They pulled the backboard from underneath him and handed it back to Travis. Who then left the room to let Owen and Link work. Schmitt walked into the room at the perfect time. "Woah, is that Adams?" he exclaimed. "Yes, but the interns do not need to know yet, not right this second," Owen and Link said at the same time. "Where do you need me?" he asked. "Can you suture that facial wound on his forehead?" Owen asked. "Sure," he nods, snapping a pair of gloves on. "I need a suture kit," he tells the nurse. She nodded her head and left the room to find the kit.
Owen was handed the portable ultrasound from another nurse that had just walked into the room with it. He squirted the gel and grabbed the wand. The whoosh of the wand is what kept some noise in the room, besides the monitor. "He's bleeding internally, he needs the OR," he says. "How bad do you think it is?" Link asked from the foot of the bed; who was getting ready to pop the leg back into place. "I won't know until I get in there. Are you about done here?" he asked. "Yeah. I need to set his leg and then I'll be done. I need to cast his arm. His leg needs surgery," he informs him.
He turned to look at Schmitt, who was putting the last suture in. "Schmitt. Book an OR. And put the patient as John Doe. The interns DO NOT need to hear about this yet. We'll inform them when the time's right," Owen ordered. He nodded his head and snapped his gloves off his hands and threw them in the trash can and ripped his gown off and left.
Link popped his leg back into place and said, "There. I'll join you in the OR," Schmitt came back in and told them that OR 2 was ready and open. Both of the men ripped their gowns and gloves off. They left the room, pushing the stretcher. The same nurse was still pumping the Ambu bag. Owen was lucky that Richard and Winston had the interns distracted in the Sim Lab. Or they would've been crowding around. Owen pressed the button for the elevator. He was praying that it was going to be empty.
They waited a few minutes. The doors slid open. Thankfully, it was empty. He pressed another button. "How do we tell Meredith and Amelia?" Schmitt asked. "We'll figure that out when we get there. We need to get Adams stabilized before we do anything else," Link tells him. The elevator doors slid open. They wheeled Adams in and the 3 men scrubbed in. Knox pushed propofol, ketamine, and etomidate. They finished scrubbing in. An OR nurse met the 3 of them by the sliding door and gowned and gloved them both.
Everything was prepped, including his leg, and stomach, which were visibly bruised. Schmitt helped Owen. Link was capable of working by himself. Once Hunt cut his stomach open, he was met with blood; which triggered the alarm. "Damn it where is all of this blood coming from?" he said. He asked for lap pads left and right; and suctioning. Schmitt reached in and felt around where the blood was coming from.
He found it after feeling around for a few seconds. "It's his splenic artery. Hand me a clamp," he said, clamping the artery with his fingers until Bokhee handed him a clamp. The alarm on the monitor stopped. Owen kept moving the suction around to get the blood out. They had a clear view now, and the clamp on the artery. "3-0 silk," Owen requested, holding out one of his bloody gloves. The silk was placed in his hands. He put 3 sutures in the artery and Schmitt let go of the clamp.
Now everything was normal. There was very little blood in their field of view. "We need to get him to CT when we're done here, do you think he'll be stable?" Link asked, with a drill in his hand; after drilling a plate and screw in. "Everything's normal here," Owen tells him. Amid everything that happened in the last 2 hours of being in the OR; Link put 1 plate, and 4 screws.
They both closed at the same time and headed to CT. The machine whizzed as they waited a few minutes for results. "Montgomery said his pupils were equal and reactive right?" Schmitt asked. "Yeah. But there's significant brain swelling on CT. But we'll need to keep a close eye on his heart rate and make sure he doesn't get an infection on his sutures," Owen said.
Owen and Link tasked Schmitt with telling the interns. But he had other things to do first before he even could; since he was the only chief resident at Grey-Sloan. He begged Helm to come back. But she wouldn't budge from Joe's bar. Even Richard tried to get her to come back. But she wouldn't budge.
Hunt got him settled into the ICU room. Once everything was settled; they paged Amelia once again. Meredith was in a meeting, so who knows where Amelia was. He stayed in the room until Amelia showed up, 30 minutes later. "What the hell happened?" she asked. "A car crashed into a cafe he was at. He was pinned. Link and I already went in. We took him for a CT afterward. He's got significant brain swelling. And you need to relieve it. Now I know he's your nephew, and we have a rule; but you're the only neurosurgeon we have," Owen tells her.
"I could do a Ventriculostomy or a Craniectomy," she says. "But we need to go back to CT so I can see how much swelling," she adds. "We tried to page you earlier, but you wouldn't answer," he says. "I was in surgery, it took longer than I thought," she sighs. Then they took him back to CT. It revealed significant swelling again. Amelia inhaled. "He'll need a Craniectomy. That's significant. I'll have to insert a drain as well," she responds.
So she booked another OR, a different one. She never expected to operate on her nephew. After she was done, she placed him in a medically induced coma so his brain could recover. They put him back in the same ICU room. Closely monitored by the nurses on the floor so the interns wouldn't stumble upon his room.
The curtains of the room remained closed, and the door. The only ones that were allowed in for right now were Amelia, Meredith, Link, Owen, and Schmitt. Once the interns were to find out, they would be allowed in. But not right now. Everything was stable, but he was okay. Meredith and Amelia were the only ones that stayed in the room full-time. All of the other interns kept coming in when they weren't there. So they had no idea that he was yet related to Meredith and Amelia.
They played the waiting game. A couple of days passed. Amelia decided to take him out of the medically induced coma and let him wake up on his own. His brain was well-rested enough. It was another waiting game. It had almost been a week in the hospital. They were hoping it didn't get too far. Owen extubated him and wrapped it up and threw it away.
Now it is considered the waiting game. Meredith and Amelia had other things going on, so they couldn't stay in the room for very long. Everyone else in the hospital had known so far, except for the interns. There was no one in the room at the time when he woke up. He groaned when he smelled the air. It smelled like sanitizer. He opened his eyes to find that he was in Grey-Sloan. How did he get here? He didn't know. He tried to sit up, but his right leg was being held down. And his right arm was wrapped in something he couldn't even identify.
His heart rate spiked, but it didn't set off the monitor. He was confused about how he got here. He didn't even remember what had happened. Meredith was coming into the ICU when she looked straight ahead into his room. She ran into the room to stop him from trying to get out of bed. "Okay, take it easy now," she encouraged. "How in the heck did I get here?" he asks. "A car ran into the cafe you were at, and you were pinned underneath the car that hit the cafe. You were right there on impact," she informs him.
He groaned before speaking, "I was in the wrong place, wrong time. Don't know what in the hell led me to go to that cafe, even if it's one of my regulars," "Things happen, you never know when they do," she tells him, laying a hand on his casted arm. "Do you know when I can get out of these casts?" he said, pointing with his non-injured arm at his right one. "In most cases, a broken arm heals within 6-8 weeks. But with your leg, you had a compression fracture in your tibia. So Link had to go in and put a plate and screw. He called the break in your tibia an open and complete fracture," she says. "But how long am I out?" he questioned.
"As you see, Link puts a metal frame outside your leg, it keeps your leg stabilized during the healing process. And it's removed after 6-8 weeks. But there's a risk of infection in the surgical pins. But since you're a Shepherd, that won't ever occur. So you'll be out for some time," she finishes. "Is there any other way I could get my leg healed faster?" he asked her. "Well, you could do physical therapy. It quickens your recovery. It shortens your recovery by 3-4 weeks," she responds. "If I don't?" he asks. "You might never regain your mobility in your leg again," she says sadly.
"Do the interns know?" he asked her. She shook her head. "Unless you want them to figure this out," she suggested. "No, I'm like Derek. Keeping things private is how I work," he sighs. He looked her in her eyes. "Look, if you don't want me to bring up Derek in front of you; you can tell me," he says, grabbing ahold of her hand. She sighed. "No, it's okay. Bringing up memories helps me cope more. Even if he's been gone for 5 years now. You remind me of him. Stubborn, driven, hell you're even smart," she tells him.
"Just like he was," he adds. She nodded her head. "Exactly," she says softly. "Amelia never told me anymore about him. What was he like?" he asked her. "Well, there's a lot," she looked at the time. "I have an hour to tell you some," she says, looking him in the eyes. "Let's do it," he smiled. She sat there and talked about him. He even told stories that she didn't even know about him. She enjoyed the smile on his face. She stayed longer than she thought she would. They talked and laughed. This is what he needed. A smile on his face. That reminded her of Derek.
"You need to come over and meet your cousins. You know that right?" she tells him. "I know, it's just with the shifts I have and now this. I haven't found time," he says, fidgeting with his hands. "Lucas. Spend time with your family," she says briefly. "I know," he sighs. "Use this time. Come recover at my place. Alex's room is still open from when he left, use his," she recommends. "Are you sure? I don't mean to intrude..," he says. "You won't, the kids will barely bother you when you need to rest. I'll make sure of that. They're mine anyways," she responds.
"If you say so," he chuckles. "Now, just to remind you. They like trampling on you when you first walk in, but I'll tell them to take it easy on you," she adds. "I appreciate you doing this," he tells her. "You're family. What's family for?" she shrugs. She patted his leg softly and smiled at him. He got discharged that next day. Time passed, and rehab passed. Everything was back to normal for Lucas and everyone else at Grey-Sloan. He was back to work within a couple of months.