A/N: Hello again! I really liked what was set up in the last episode. I am super excited to see next weeks. Also, I have two bits of news. First, for those of you who like my holidayverse Japril family stuff from Christmas time, you are in luck. A Valentine's Day oneshot is coming up around Thursday. And for those of you waiting for an AK2 update, one of those is coming soon too! (I get busy on grad school so I have to slow down on writing, but I really am always chugging along). Thank you all so much for reading, and please let me know what you think.

Shane Ross was a stand up guy. He was not a criminal, or a 'rebel' by any stretch of the imagination. In general, he followed all laws. He liked rules. Rules gave you a game plan, order, and justice. Shane was never one to really go against the grain. And when he did, he wasn't very good at hiding it. Shane was a terrible liar.

So the last thing he'd ever expected to find himself involved with a team of surgeons, his mentor even, as they embarked on a rogue surgery in a closed Emergency Room. With buyers in the building no less. Totally against the rules.

But all of that paled in importance when you considered the life of a child hanging in the balance. Shane now understood that rules and hierarchy and all of that didn't matter. Sometimes the rules were just wrong. His grandmother always told him that when you know something is right, you have to fight for it. Even if it was hard or not popular. They were all fighting now.

They sat, lined up like children after a fight on the school yard, waiting outside the conference room like it was the principle's office. Shane winced as he heard the raised voices of Dr. Avery and Dr. Karev coming from behind the closed doors. He couldn't help the nervous bouncing of his legs. Even though the kid had survived, and Shane was happy about that, he also knew that this was big. Cahill was probably taking someone down for this. All of them likely.

And doing the right thing or not, Shane did not want to lose his spot in the program. He didn't want to have to explain to his grandmother the cost of doing the right thing. Not after all she and the rest of his family had done to get him here in the first place.

"Hey," April said quietly, gently patting his leg and catching his eye. "No matter what happens, I will make sure that they know that you interns were just following orders. This'll be on me, not you."

"It'll be on all of us, April," Medusa corrected from his other side.

From her spot leaning against the wall across from them, Dr. Yang agreed, "We're not hanging anyone out to try, Dopes."

Shane looked back to Kepner. She swallowed and nodded. Jo twisted her hands nervously in front of her, while Stephanie scuffed her feet. Watching everyone around him, it was clear that they were all more nervous about this than anyone wanted to let on. He looked up at the sound of footsteps, and nodded when Dr. Shepherd joined them.

Shane was really starting to get it now. The way things were at Seattle Grace. People really cared here. That was what one of the recruitment brochures had said. Learn from doctors who really care. This whole thing had demonstrated that the attendings cared not only about their patients, but about their colleagues as well. Even when on an average day, it might seem as though the doctors didn't always get along.

After all, Dr. Grey was sitting by Shane right now. And she had worked with him all through the surgery without so much as a glare or a lecture. She'd even told him that he'd done a nice job after he'd assisted on the hit and run boy's surgery. Only days before Shane was sure he'd still felt the sting of his failure from her over his colossal cock up with the liver when he was last on her service. But now that didn't matter so much.

This day even made Shane feel like he was a part of the clan.

Everyone gasped and looked up as Avery and Karev burst back into the hallway. Both men were still scowling and immediately headed down the hall away from the conference room, Cahill, and the other doctors waiting outside. Heather followed them out looking a little more shell shocked than she normally did. She offered Shane a small tight lipped smile and moved to the side as Derek Shepherd slipped in to the conference room.

"Hey!" Dr. Yang demanded as the still angry Avery and Karev continued to walk down the hall.

Dr. Grey eased herself to her feet, "What happened?"

"Cahill's pissed. Hunt is too," Karev mumbled. "Whatever. We saved the kid."

"What exactly did they say?" Kepner asked urgently, standing up as well.

Shane's eyes moved carefully between his mentor and her...between Kepner and Avery. Because despite all the other people listening intently in the crowded hallway, it was clear that it was Jackson, above anyone else, who April was talking to. They only had eyes for each other.

Breaking the stare, Avery stopped, and his brow furrowed. He licked his lips and shrugged, "Nothing much. I said it was my call to let you bring him in. Hunt told us to get out. The kid didn't die...so...it's not like any of us are going to get sued. It's...like Karev said. It's crap. If something comes of it we can deal with whatever."

He lifted his gaze to Kepner's for a second, and he swallowed. The other man still appeared to be angry and frustrated, but there was also something else beneath all of that. Puzzlement maybe? Confusion? Melancholy. Avery was hard to read. To Shane, it felt like there was a lot more that wanted to be said there.

But Avery looked away when Stephanie cleared her throat and the moment was over, seemingly missed or ignored by everyone else. Karev nudged Avery's shoulder and said, "Come on, we gotta go check on Ryan's post op."

Jo and Steph practically jogged to follow the two male attendings as they briskly walked down the hall.

"We should check on the boy," Dr. Yang added, bringing the shell shocked doctors out of their thoughts. The three remaining attendings stood up, and Shane and Heather followed them.

She smirked and nudged Shane, "And we should find out exactly who this boy is."

First Grey did her general checks, followed by Yang's cardio checks. Nothing out of the ordinary.

The patient was doing as well as could be expected. Not as well as Shane might have liked, but when you went ahead and considered the fact that he was not only hit by a car earlier in they day, but that he'd also been triaged in a closed trauma center that was basically a construction site, the state of affairs really didn't seem so bad. All things considered it was a heck of a lot better than being dead. And the child would certainly have died if the ambulance had tried to take him all the way to Redmond.

Shane shook his head. What an odd stroke of luck that Kepner had been out on her 'date' with Matthew. And that she was the kind of person who didn't allow patients to die if she could help it, rules be damned. Even more luck that she called Dr. Avery, and he didn't turn her away. The kid was alive in part because of the strange and awkward saga of someone else's life.

Looking over the child's chart's one more time, Shane glanced up to his mentor. They were the only ones left in the room, and things seemed to be stable with the boy. His phone buzzed, and Shane quickly read a message from Heather.

"Uh, his parents are here," Shane told Dr. Kepner awkwardly. "Shall I go out and talk to them?"

She shook her head, "No. I should do it, I brought him here. You go ahead and go home, Ross. Thank you. You were very helpful today."

He pursed his lips and nodded, making his way out of the patients room and down the hallway toward the lockers. Shane couldn't stop his mind from moving as quickly as his feet. It was very interesting indeed that April had called Jackson first in all of this. Professionally, it wasn't as though Kepner didn't have other options.

She could have called anyone really. She could have called Yang or Grey. Karev was a pediatric surgeon, and calling him would have made sense too. It would have been logical to call someone with more clout or power. Granted, some one like Hunt or even Bailey would probably have said no, but it was clear that at least one of the senior attendings would have been willing to help them. Dr. Shepherd had come through for them with the drug codes. And by stalling Cahill and the buyers.

Shane arrived in the locker room and quickly changed into his street clothes.

So why had Kepner called Avery? Well, Shane knew that she had strong feelings for him. She'd told him as much. But then again, she had actually seemed pretty happy with tall paramedic guy, so there was the argument to be made that her feelings might be starting to fade. Add to that, there was a lot of evidence that Avery and Kepner were still very much avoiding each other as much as they could.

The night nurse on level five had told Shane and Heather that way back when, right after the terrible shooting two years previous, Jackson and April had been almost inseparable during their free time. She figured it was because their friends from Mercy West had died, but she could scarcely recall a lunch or coffee break where the two didn't sit together. A mutual protection kind of thing. The woman said it was kind of a 3 plus 2 thing. Yang, Grey, and Karev as a tight set of three. Jackson and April as two.

These days the picture was very different. The current equation was more like 4 plus 2 interns minus April and a handful of burritos. She spent her lunches with Matthew in the rig, instead of the attendings lounge. Except, today things had been very simple. Everyone had everyone else' s back.

To Shane though, the call made it clear that April still thought of Jackson as that one person; a part of the plus 2 that was Kepner and Avery. And the fact that Jackson had answered? The fact that he had not only gone against Cahill in the first place was one thing, but Avery's assertive willingness to take the fall for everything...Shane just thought it had to mean something. It wasn't like Dr. Avery would do anything like that for Stephanie, no matter how ridiculous she became in her efforts to help the man become the face of the hospital. It just wasn't the same. He was certain that if the call had come from anyone else, even Yang or Grey, Avery would have said no. Only for April.

There had been a moment, when the doors to the ER had been stuck. Shane had been right by Dr. Avery, straining to pull the damn things open. When April and the gurney and the paramedics ran up to the closed doors. The whole thing was really a panic, kid dying on the gurney, paramedics doing what they could and everyone else pulling with all their might to get the doors to open. In that moment it was Jackson's name April called. Not Avery, because Shane didn't think she was asking the professional 'face of the hospital', "I grow skin and shit", ego driven Dr. Avery that they'd all seen strutting around the hospital for the past few days.

You don't call out like that in a professional way. April was calling out to the person she cared deeply about and trusted fully to help. Her Jackson.

If that didn't reveal to the both of them that feelings were deeper than the freaking Puget Sound, then Shane didn't know what could convince them. Sure his efforts in subtlety had thus far been fruitless, but come on. Were they blind? Shane wasn't a violent guy; competitive, maybe, but not violent. For virtually all things Shane was non-confrontational He wasn't a violent guy, but sometimes he wondered whether a swift kick in the head would do both his mentor and Avery good. Get them to see things clearly, and to say things clearly, and best of all get the plastic surgeon to get the hell away from his friend Stephanie.

It was all so damn frustrating.

Over the past few weeks, Shane was beginning to get nervous about her. Steph seemed like she was actually getting emotionally involved with Dr. Avery. Jo and Heather told him that she'd say things here or there that made it sound like she at least was starting to invest more in the whole thing. Shane hated that. And not just because of his own self serving feelings. Or even because he was well aware of how emotionally unavailable Jackson Avery was. Shane hated it because it meant that somehow or another, his friend was going to get hurt. Which was the one thing he hadn't wanted for her all along.

Shane tied his shoes and stood up, slowly making his way out of the locker room to head home. On his way to the parking lot, he encountered two people he hadn't expected to see. The first he ran into as he exited the locker room and stepped in to the hall.

Carefully closing the door behind him, Shane was surprised to find Dr. Avery leaning on the wall next to the door, jaw tightly set. He kept his head down and tried to brush past the other man. He wasn't very good at hiding his irritation, and so he was pretty certain that Avery didn't like him much. Which was fine, because Shane wasn't actually sure he liked Dr. Avery that much. It just made things uncomfortable when they were on their own.

The older man cleared his throat, asking softly, "Hey, uh...is Stephanie in there?"

"Not yet," Shane shook his head. "I think she is helping Dr. Brooks finish charting. They should be down any minute."

When Avery didn't respond right away, Shane lingered awkwardly uncertain as to whether or not he was dismissed. The attending was still looking at him like he was supposed to say or do something else, so he hovered by the door.

"Good job today, Ross," Jackson said finally. "Keeping the look out. You were an important part of why that whole operation went well."

Shane shrugged, "Everyone did really good work today. No nurses, no ER...I mean, we all stepped up."

"Yeah..." Avery agreed.

Shane's eyes sparked. He couldn't resist, "Everyone. From interns on up to attendings."

Jackson scratched the back of his head, irritated,"Yep...I know. I was there."

"And how about those paramedics? Coming through with that portable suction," Shane pressed forward, wanting to stab and twist whatever little emotional knife he could.

He realized he might actually be a little more violent than he thought. At least in the subtly-verbal (his own word invention) sense. He tried to believe he was only doing it to help everyone out. To help his mentor and Jackson and his...and Stephanie. This had nothing to do with jealousy. Right? Then again...guys don't just hang out with girls.

"I mean, can you imagine? You start off on a nice lunch date and-"

"Riding along in an ambulance is not a nice lunch date," Jackson shook his head.

Shane held back a victorious smirk. He smelled jealousy. The whole thing was messing with Dr. Avery. The man wasn't super easy to read. He didn't always carry his emotions on his sleeve, but he was not match for Shane. Years of carefully watching his own familial dramas had made him a master observer. At least, when it came to stuff like this. Other people's love lives. He'd proven to be terrible at dealing with his own.

shoving his hands in his pockets, Shane played it casual and moved down the hallway, "Well, I'm pretty sure Dr. Kepner and that tall paramedic guy thought it was..."

"She barely knows him," Avery retorted.

"I don't know, isn't getting to know someone the whole point of dating?"

And with that, Shane made his way down the elevator and out the doors that led to the parking lot without looking back once to Dr. Avery. He kept his head down, putting one foot in front of the other, moving across the side walk and crashing right into the second unexpected person of the night. The tall paramedic guy.

"Uh, sorry," he apologized, unconsciously holding his hands up in surrender. He'd learned long ago on the playgrounds of the projects. Don't mess with the tall guys.

The paramedic didn't even seem to notice the collision. He clenched his fists with a nervous energy and muttered for a moment before glancing up distractedly.

"Oh...no problem..."

"Okay..." Shane moved toward the dim parking lot.

"Hey, can I ask you something?" the man asked suddenly.

"Sure...um...Matthew, isn't it?"

Matthew nodded and sighed, "Yeah."

Silence fell between them. Shane leaned forward with raised eyebrows.

"So...What did you wanna ask?"

The other man smiled, clearing his throat, "You know Ape-uh...you know Dr. Kepner, don't you?"

"I do."

"Is she?" Matt winced and shook himself again, laughing awkwardly. "Does she...? What I mean is...she's like that all the time isn't she? Just so...amazing."

Shane winced and bit his lip, reluctantly replying, "You could say that."

"Wow," Matthew nodded, and laughed again, a shy nervous sound that made Shane frown.

It was kind of true, he supposed. Just because Shane didn't have feelings for Dr. Kepner like that, didn't mean he couldn't see how someone else would. In his own experience she was a great teacher and a good person. And not a bad friend either. She was attractive and amazing on many levels. The reluctance of his tone related more to the fact that he was pretty sure this guy was falling for Kepner already. At least a little bit.

Which was good for her. April had told him after the paramedic had first asked her out, that it was nice to be wanted. Shane just had a feeling that yet another innocent bystander was being added to the mix. In the end, he suspected that Matthew, like Stephanie, would probably end up hurt. And scheming and subtle digs aside? Shane knew there was very little he could do to avoid the emotion fallout that he predicted this whole situation would have. He couldn't protect this paramedic anymore than he could his friend.

All the same, the guy was nice enough. Matthew had proven to be cool under pressure and had been a big help in the makeshift ER. Maybe Shane's theories about Kepner and Avery were wrong and they didn't love each other. Or Shane was right, and it was only a matter of time be for something or someone got them both to do see it. Either way Matt was here now. And even though he might get hurt badly, Shane figured Matthew deserved his moment with Kepner anyway.

He gestured behind him, toward the hospital doors, repeating almost the same words he'd spoken to Dr. Avery only moments before, "I think she is just finishing up with the boy. Our patient from today. She should be down in a minute. I bet you can catch her."

Matthew's eyes lit up and he bounced from once foot to the other.

Shane gestured to the wall near cement emergency stairs, "You probably wanna wait there so you can see the doors better."

"Thanks."

The paramedic nodded, and moved to stand in the spot, leaning back against the wall. It was clear to Shane that the guy was retreating into his own thoughts again, so he waved goodbye and his arms close to his chest, bracing himself against the drizzly Seattle night, eager to get back to his apartment and kick of his shoes.

It had been one hell of a day.