"Duck?" Gibbs questioned, real concern showing on his face.
Before the doctor could answer there came a shrill alarm and Tony's eyes rolled into the back of his head.
"Anthony, can you hear me?" Ducky asked, his eyes going from his patient to the monitors connected to him.
He got no reply and was about to feel for a pulse when Dr Pitt came up beside him.
"We'll take over Dr Mallard, please can you all wait outside."
At first it looked like Ducky was going to ignore the request, but after less than a minute he decided that he would only be in the way and turned to usher Ziva and McGee from the room. The door was shut behind them and all they could do was wait for news and hope that it was good.
Inside the room Gibbs was frantic, he'd seen Tony in bad shape before and thought he knew how to handle himself, this however seemed different. Dr Pitt and the nurses were talking, half the stuff he couldn't understand but the words he did pick up just made his stomach turn and his heart rate increase.
"Will somebody tell me what the hell's going on!" He exclaimed, getting up from the bed, ready to rip out the IV that was feeding him god knows what.
"Agent Gibbs please get back into bed, we're doing all we can and you distracting us is not going to help." Dr Pitt responded, knowing Gibbs and knowing what sort of things to say to get him to stand down. "When Tony's stable I'll talk to you."
Gibbs sat back down and removed his right hand from his left, hoping he wasn't making a mistake in letting Pitt take all the control. He watched silently as the doctor worked, flinching when they put a tube down Tony's throat and looking away as they sliced into his side to put in a chest tube. He almost couldn't stand the silence, but the alarms had stopped and Dr Pitt looked calmer, so he guessed that whatever they were trying to do was working.
"Sandra, I need a chest X-ray, will you call ahead and let them know we're coming."
"Of course doctor."
Sandra left the room and Dr Pitt took out his stethoscope, listening first to the right side of Tony's chest and then the left. Satisfied by what he heard he put the device back around his neck and turned to Agent Gibbs.
"I'm sending Tony for an X-ray to make sure the tube is doing its job and to check out how much damage has been done. While he's gone, I'll go through what just happened with you and your team."
Gibbs just nodded, knowing that for the moment his senior field agent was ok and that he would soon be getting the answers that he needed.
A few minutes passed in silence, Gibbs and Dr Pitt just watching the patient and then an orderly arrived and Tony was wheeled out and Ducky, McGee and Ziva re-entered the room.
"How is he?" Ziva asked almost immediately.
It had not been pleasant for the three team members to be left in the corridor, wondering what was happening behind closed doors. They were all eager to find out what was going on and if Tony was going to be ok.
"I won't lie it was touch and go for a few minutes. Tony suffered from what we call secondary drowning, he developed Pulmonary edema, which is when fluid builds up in the lungs. We had to put him on a ventilator and insert a chest tube to drain the fluid."
"Why wasn't this picked up before?" Gibbs asked, trying to keep the anger out of his voice.
"Tony presented with extreme fatigue, slight difficulty breathing and he was a little shocky. There was no way to know that this was going to happen. The only way to diagnose Pulmonary edema is to do a chest X-ray and before you say it Agent Gibbs, I had already booked him in for one. He seemed ok so I didn't mark it as urgent, believe me when I say I'm beating myself up over that."
"Brad you said it yourself you had no way of knowing. I myself looked Anthony over and deemed him to be getting better, I could argue with you that I should have noticed the signs and done something sooner," Ducky replied to the doctor. "We both know that blaming ourselves will do Anthony no good, so it is pointless. We shall just both have to do a better job from now on."
"You're right Dr Mallard, I can't help Tony standing here blaming myself," Dr Pitt said. "If you have anymore questions then have one of the nurses page me, I'm going to go see how Tony's X-rays look."
All four of the rooms occupants watched the doctor leave and then stood silently, looking at the space where their team member should have been, all of them hoping that when he returned things could start to get back to normal.
Authors note: Thank you so much for the reviews. Sorry it's a little short, wanted to make sure you guys had something. I looked up the medical bits so hopefully they're accurate, hope you enjoyed.