"Dr. Tigulaar, can you drop these files off in Dr. Thropp's office?"
Fiyero had just clocked in, and already, the nurses were throwing files in his face. He gave them a forced smile and affirmative hum, knowing they had the power to drop-kick him, and wouldn't hesitate to do it.
"Dr. Thropp?" he asked, knocking on her ajar door.
Her back was to him, and she was staring at printed scans on the light screen. "Hmm?"
"I have some files for you."
"Oh. You can leave them on my desk."
He set the files down very carefully.
"Are all your patients dead?" she asked when Fiyero didn't leave.
"Huh?"
"Very eloquent. Let me repeat: Are. All. Your. Patients. Dead?"
"N-No, Dr. Thropp."
"Then why are you still standing here? Is there something else you need from me? Have I not given you enough assignments? Are you bored?"
He turned to leave, but stopped in the doorway. "Do you like me or hate me?"
Elphaba finally turned with a frown. "That's a stupid question."
"I need you to answer the stupid question."
Her glare hardened. "You shouldn't have time to worry about whether I like you or not. That's completely irrelevant to your job. You wanna know what I like? I like making sure the code team is staffed. I like it when pages are answered in a timely manner. I like it when I don't have to deal with slow interns asking stupid questions when they're supposed to be working. That's how you get me to not hate you."
He nodded in resignation and opened the door, but still didn't leave. "What are you looking at?"
She gave him a quick once-over, but sighed. "CT scans for a diagnostic team patient. She's having Grand Mal seizures, and we can't figure out why. We're running out of time."
Fiyero stepped up to her, ignoring the look she gave him. "How old is the patient?"
"Twenty."
"Brain films look clean."
"That's part of the problem." She grabbed her metal tumbler and guided the metal straw into her mouth, and Fiyero pretended to ignore how she turned away from him.
"Wait… what's that?" He pointed to a dark spot near the right side of the brain. "Is that… a blood vessel tear?"
She followed his finger and squinted. "It's so tiny, it's hard to tell." She jumped to her computer, opened the digital file of the scan, and zoomed in on where Fiyero was pointing. "Yes," she breathed. "Yes, it is a tear. It's tiny, but it's there. It looks like it's trying to clot, but slowly bleeding out."
"This looks like the types of tears consistent with a fall. Was she –"
"She went skiing. The nurse said she was recounting her last skiing trip. She must have taken a really hard fall. She could have spent the rest of her life without it being a problem, but one hit in the wrong place –"
"The clot would've burst. She's gonna need surgery."
She paged Tibbett, asking him to come to her office. The attending neurosurgeon hurried in, and Elphaba showed him their newest finding.
"Wonderful. Let's gather the team and let our patient know. Thank you, Dr. Thropp," Tibbett grinned.
"Actually, I didn't even see it at first. Dr. Tigulaar noticed the dark spot," Elphaba said, giving Fiyero what he chose to believe was a small smile.
"I have been telling you to get new glasses," Tibbett chuckled, ignoring Elphaba's glare. "Thank you, Dr. Tigulaar. You saved our patient."
"Of course, Dr. Miluyse," Fiyero smiled, feeling very proud of himself.
The neurosurgeon nodded and hurried out, seemingly happily. When Fiyero looked back at Elphaba, the smile was gone, replaced with that same unreadable expression she got when debating whether to chastise him.
"I do have potential, you know," he said with a small shrug.
Her features relaxed slightly. "I never said you didn't." She sat down at her desk. "Dr. Tigulaar?"
"Yes?"
"Your patients better not be dead when we do rounds this afternoon."
He gulped and hurried out.
The rest of Fiyero's day was relatively light. He checked on his patients, happily discharged a few of them, and reminded himself that even if he wasn't doing something, to always look busy. The last thing he wanted was for Dr. Thropp to think he was lollygagging.
His phone buzzed and he ducked behind a corner before pulling it out, revealing a text from Shem.
Meet in the NWBC in 10 mins.
The north wing back corridor had become the intern's secret spot to debrief (and rant when necessary, though it always was) without the resident's and attending's prying eyes. The rooms were empty and most of the equipment was out of commission. The hospital didn't want to throw any of the expensive machinery away, so they kept them for teaching-on-dummy purposes.
Cool, he texted before shoving his phone back in his pocket and making his way over, still looking like he was in a busy hurry.
The other interns were already gathered, all in varying stages of dejected and defeated. Pfannee and ShenShen were sitting on the floor, backs against the wall; Milla was rocking in a wheelchair, and Shem was slumped on an old gurney, his head in his hands.
"I don't know what's going on, but lately, I've been feeling like I have no idea what I'm doing," Pfannee groaned. "These cases seem easy on paper, but then I get onto the room and –"
"Completely different," ShenShen finished for her.
"We're working with people, not their files," Milla pointed out.
The group slowly turned towards her. "Milla, your patients only sleep, eat, cry, and stare off into space. I got seven pop-up warnings for verbal aggression when I checked the electronic charts for my new patients," Shem said. "My ninety-three-year-old patient threatened to throw me through a wall. The scary part is that he looked like he could actually do that."
"My eighty-five-year-old patient called me a 'foot' when I came in to go over his vitals," ShenShen added. "Remind me again why we all chose to be doctors."
"Because saving lives is worth it?" Fiyero questioned with a small grin.
"Because we're in a higher tax bracket?" Milla offered.
"With crippling amounts of student debt from years of textbook reading," Pfannee grunted.
Shem's pager beeped and he glanced down. "Ah, duty calls. The nurses at station 8F have my 'throw through a wall' guy's test results. Let's hope everything comes back negative so I don't have to know what that feels like."
The other four interns stayed, slowly dissipating to answer pages until Fiyero was the only one left. He did a quick social media scroll before making his way back to the main building.
"And just where have you been?"
He jumped and turned, seeing a very unhappy-looking Glinda behind him. "I uh…"
"Dr. Thropp's been looking for you."
"She didn't page me."
"She's in her office. If you don't have a good enough alibi, just say I told you to get me a snack from the cafeteria. She won't be happy, but she won't argue with you."
He smiled. "Thanks for saving my life."
She grinned. "It's the least I can do when you probably didn't do anything to deserve her wrath in the first place."
His smile vanished. "Wrath?"
"Just go."
He hurried away to her office, lightly knocking on her closed door.
"Come in."
He opened the door and slipped inside. "Dr. Thropp –"
"Where have you been?"
"Nurse Upland-Chuffrey sent me to get her a snack from the cafeteria."
She turned. "If you're going to lie to my face – which I don't recommend doing – but if you're brainless enough to do it anyway, I'd appreciate it if you leave my friend out of it."
"But she tol- never mind. Of course, Dr. Thropp."
She didn't look happy, but let the matter rest. "Trapper Cherrystone is visiting tomorrow."
"The Chief Medical Officer?"
"Yes. He's going to observe the diagnostic team, which means I'll be unavailable tomorrow. I wanted to make sure you'll be alright on your own."
Aww, she really does care, he thought, fighting to keep the smile off his face. "Yes, Dr. Thropp. I'll be fine."
"Good. Follow-up question: are you prepared to present a few of your cases tomorrow?"
"T-Tomorrow… as in –"
"To Dr. Cherrystone. Yes. This would be a personal favor to me, so you can say no –"
"I'll do it."
She didn't plan on being interrupted, nor did she plan on him agreeing, so she was understandably sputtering. "I… you will?"
"Yes."
"Oh. Okay. Great. Thank you. That means Dr. Ottokos will be doing sutures in the clinic, which covers all my intern placements." She made a note in her book. "Thank you, Dr. Tigulaar."
"It's my honor to help you make sure all your troublesome interns are in line and out of your way." He said it jokingly, but Elphaba's face told him the joke went right over her head.
"I hope you don't make me regret this decision."
"I think you can trust me a bit more than you do. I did help you with a case, remember? How is the patient, but the way?"
"Dr. Miluyse was able to fix the tear and clot. She's in recovery now, but we all think she'll be fine."
"That's good. Um… did you need me for anything else?"
She fiddled with her I.D., attached to her breast pocket. "No. Thank you, Dr. Tigulaar."
He nodded and left, closing the door behind him, and went to check on the rest of his patients.
"Imie?" he called, knocking on the door.
The thirteen-year-old girl in the bed looked up from her phone. "Oh."
"'Oh'? That's some way to greet the gallant prince who rescued the princess from the dragon's cave." He washed his hands and pulled up a chair. "My knees still haven't recovered from that sword fight. Where's Daddy?"
"He went to get food. He left around ten minutes ago." Her voice dropped to a whisper. "He said he'd sneak me some fries and a chocolate shake, but said not to tell you."
In truth, the father had asked if it was okay when he saw Fiyero in the hall, and Fiyero had agreed, but decided to play along with the young girl. "I don't know a thing," he chuckled, and the girl giggled.
"Are you gonna take more blood?" she asked when Fiyero checked her chart.
"I'm gonna have to. The nice lab scientists need to run more specific tests so we can figure out what's causing those bumpy rashes."
The nurse had prepped the materials for him, and he got to work. It took some time, but he found a good vein and got to work.
"I know what might help. Let's play twenty questions," he said, trying to distract the young girl from the sight of her blood leaving her arm.
"Okay," she agreed, then thought for a moment. "Why don't you have a wife?"
Whoa! Jumping right in, I see. "Uh… how do you know I don't?"
"Do you have a wife?"
"Well… no."
"I figured. You're not wearing a fancy ring like my daddy. So why don't you want a wife?"
"How do you know I don't want one?" He was starting to regret this idea, but she wasn't looking at the tube drawing her blood, so he pressed on for her sake. "I suppose I do. I just haven't found the right person yet."
"How many friends do you have?"
"Uh… four." He considered Pfannee, ShenShen, Milla, and Shem his friends. It helped that they were stuck together for many hours a day to be on good terms.
"That's not many. Why do you only have four friends?"
"I'm pretty sure I have more. I just can't think of them right now."
"You should never forget your friends."
He nodded. "That's right. You shouldn't."
"Do you like your job?"
"I'm very dedicated to my job and making my patients feel better."
"Oh. Is that why you have only four friends and no wife?"
"Huh..." He genuinely considered that question. "Maybe."
"Do you want to have children?"
"Someday."
"Will they have luxurious hair like you?"
He flashed her a cheeky grin, which made her giggle. "I hope so. But luxurious hair like this is very hard to maintain. And we're done."
Imie looked down and saw the pink Band-Aid on her arm. "That's it? But I only asked nine questions! That's not even half! And you didn't get to ask me any questions!"
"I know, but I have more patients to visit."
"What if I forget my questions?"
He looked over at the table and reached for her purple journal and sparkly pen. "You can write them down, and when I come back, we can finish our game."
"Does that mean you have to draw more blood?"
"It might, but it might not. We can continue our game regardless."
"Okay," she grinned as she took the book and pen. "Thanks, Dr. Tigulaar."
"You're welcome, Imie. Enjoy your secret snack that I don't know anything about."
She held her pointer finger to her lips and shushed him with a giggle.
…
"Dr. Thropp hates me!"
"Dr. Thropp hates all of us, Shem. You're not special," ShenShen sighed, taking her hair out of her braided bun with a relieved sigh.
The locker room was abuzz with activity at the end of the shift, but Shem's unhappy voice was the loudest of all. "She has me in the basement all morning tomorrow."
Fiyero shoved his I.D. into his bag. "You're doing sutures in the clinic, Shem, not locked in the basement. Plus, I think I've got you beat. I helped Dr. Thropp solve a medical mystery, and she didn't even thank me. Dr. Miluyse did, so I guess that's better."
"An attending looked at you?" Pfannee asked, jealously gaping at her co-worker.
"And thanked him," Milla added with equal jealousy.
Shem dismissively waved his hand with a huff. "Don't talk, Fiyero. You're going to meet the CMO."
Fiyero held up his hands in defense. "Only because Dr. Thropp wants me by her side to make sure I don't screw something up in front of an important visitor. She trusts you enough to have her out of her line of sight for the morning. She needs me attached to her hip."
"You don't want to meet the CMO?" Milla asked, slipping into her combat boots.
"I do. I mean, it's a cool opportunity." He smirked at Shem. "And it beats doing basement sutures."
"You're an ass, Tigulaar," Shem groaned, rolling his eyes and punching his upper arm.
"You're both asses for complaining," Pfannee frowned, slamming her locker door. "I got stuck with a vegetable."
"Okay, I know we're all upset Dr. Thropp hates us, but I thought we were all past calling her a –"
"No, I mean a P.V.S. patient. A forty-five-year-old woman who's been in a coma for fifteen years. She was dropped while being transferred to another room in the nursing home, and insurance says she needs to be checked out."
"At least that's one patient you don't really have to worry about. Do the check and get it over with so they can send her back."
"As much as I love easy patients, this feels like a waste of time."
"Not every day can be exciting," Fiyero said, locking his locker. "If we get too much excitement, the excitement becomes mundane, then no one gets to have any fun."
"Yeah, I guess you're right. I'm gonna head out," Pfannee said as she slung her bag over her shoulder. "Save lives..."
"So no one dies," the group responded.
It was a cheesy, silly slogan they created for their group, but it strengthened their bond and got them through the days of being prey. They parted ways at the door, beginning their treks home so they could do everything over again in the morning.