Chicago Med fic: Mercy (7/10)
PART ONE
PART TWO
PART THREE
PART FOUR
PART FIVE
PART SIX
PART SEVEN
PART EIGHT
PART NINE
PART TEN
-o-
By the time they reach the floor, Will is moderately breathless. Taking the stairs briskly is taxing, but really, it’s the adrenaline of the moment. The rush is stronger than normal, given the day he’s had, and he finds he’s only able to focus on so much at a time. Just save the life, he tells himself. Worry about the rest later. Save the life.
If he can just do that, then it’s something.
It's something.
He’s so focused on something that he doesn’t notice anything until they come out of the stairwell into the floor. The ward has been cleared out, and much of it is draped with protective covers. Some equipment is still there, but the place has been mostly abandoned due to pandemic related delays. It’s dim; it’s quiet.
It’s empty.
Why would it be empty?
Emily comes to a stop in front of him, and Will pulls up short, utterly at a loss. “Where’s the patient?” he asks, fumbling with bewilderment.
“Oh, Dr. Halstead,” she says, somewhat slowly now. She turns toward him. She’s smiling. “You don’t get it, do you?”
He shakes his head. “Get what?” he asks, and he turns around, still searching for the patient in need. He looks around blankly. “Is it a construction worker? Emily, there’s no one here--”
He hears her move closer to him, but as he turns toward her, he feels something prick his upper arm. It’s a brief sting, and he hisses in surprise, pulling back in sudden shock. He looks down, first at the needle hanging out of his bicep, and then at Emily, who is watching him back intently.
“You are the patient, Dr. Halstead,” she says with a terrifying sincerity. “It’s you.”
Gaping, he can only watch as the needle slides out from the skin. He blinks at it dumbly as he realizes that it’s been fully emptied. Whatever was in it is not coursing through his system.
WIth that realization, he feels it. His heart thuds in his chest noisily as a wave of adrenaline washes over him like a bucketful of ice water. His ears start to ring, and his vision zones out. He feels a heady emotion up and down his spine before the numbness sets in from his extremities.
By the time he feels it, leaching into his chest, he’s already on his knees.
And his heart stutters. His lungs seize.
He’s collapsing the rest of the way before he even understands what’s happening to him.
She catches him neatly, easing him back. His legs are still folded awkwardly beneath him as she cradles his upper body. She pauses for a moment, smiling that sickeningly sweet smile of hers as she arranges his limbs. She pulls his legs out from under him before positioning his arms more comfortably over his chest. She flits her fingers through his hair with a small, self satisfied nod. “See? That’s better,” she muses, smoothing his hair back from his forehead. She looks him over once more. “You don’t have to worry about a thing, okay? I used a paralytic -- completely safe and totally effective. I’ve got the dosage just right for your body mass so it’s fast and efficient in getting the job done. You won’t feel anything. It’s just as easy as going to sleep.”
His mind reels even as his body shuts down. The horror is hard to grasp, but the meaning is starting to become clear.
“Hush,” she says, looking somewhat distressed. “Why are you struggling? You don’t need to struggle, Dr. Halstead. That’s all over now. It’s all done. I’m giving you respite. Take it. Just take it.”
Respite. As easy as going to sleep.
She’s going to--
She’s--
Will panics as he comes to the conclusion he can’t avoid. She’s killing him, just like she’s killed all the other patients. An effective concoction of drugs to make swift, painless and almost impossible to trace unless you know what you’re looking for. That’s why none of the cases have made sense. They haven’t been looking for the right things. It’s a trail you have to want to find, and it’s a trail that’s circulating right now in Will’s slowing bloodstream.
She shuts the body down.
Then she stops the heart.
It looks like a heart attack.
No one knows it’s murder.
The darkness is coming closer, and he feels the weight start to lay heavy on his body. He can’t move his limbs anymore, and the mere motion of speaking requires all the focus he has. “Why?” he asks, the sound nothing more than a croak.
Her brow creases, her fingers lingering in his hair. “I really wish you wouldn’t struggle,” she soothes, fingers carding once more through his hair. “I’ve seen you, Dr. Halstead. I’ve seen how truly unhappy you are.”
He takes a staggering breath, but his lungs are contracting less and less. He can feel the faltering beat of his heart even as she smiles. Her fingers cup his cheek, and this time, his voice fails him and he exerts all his effort on breathing instead.
“That’s no way to live, trying and failing -- always failing,” she says emphatically. “But you don’t have to suffer, not anymore. You’ve been so kind to me, so dedicated, so this is the best I can do to return the favor. I promise you, the suffering is over. You don’t have to feel that way, not anymore.”
The paralytic is strong, but his eyes widen as she unsheaths another needle. She trains this one at the crook of his arm, sliding it in right where an IV would go. His mind screams, but there’s nothing he can do as she injects it easily into his bloodstream.
He’s already numb from the paralytic, but it lances like a fire up and down his spine. There’s a momentary sensation of warm in his arm that races to his heart and settles hard and fast like a weight.
His heart stutters.
He feels it as the contraction falters, the chambers falling out of rhythm nearly instantly. The heart muscle rebels, but between the second medication and the paralytics, there’s nothing to be done. He feels the heart attack as it starts, seizing up his chest and closing his throat the rest of the way. Lights explode behind his eyes, and his mouth falls open. There’s no air, though. There’s no more movement. The spike of adrenaline is only momentary, and the cascading failures in his body overwhelm him, and he stares stupidly up at her.
She shushes him again, lifting him up closer until she’s cradling his head more securely. Her fingers trace over his face and into his hair. He’s going cold again, and things begin to fade. He thinks of the ED several floors below, going on like everything is normal. They need to know -- not about him, but her. They need to know about her.
Jay is going to be so, so mad at him.
But no one else will be disappointed. They’re already expecting the worst. No one else will miss him.
“See?” she asks, lulling him now. “That’s better now. That’s better. It’s almost over. You don’t have to prove yourself now. It’s almost done now.”
His eyes burn but no tears come. His throat seizes but no words are formed. He’s panicking, the last vestiges of his willpower before the drugs roll over him one more time and the paralysis is complete. His heart thuds dully in his chest, slower and slower.
She smiles, like this is their little secret. It dies with him.
“It’s okay, Dr. Halstead,” she soothes one more time. “I’ve taken care of everything for you. Just close your eyes. Just go to sleep.”
He has no choice but to obey, her fingers flicking over his face and drawing his eyelids shut.
His heart resounds, one last marker of his life. He’s sorry, then. He’s so, so sorry.
He feels her, only vaguely, as she lowers him to the ground. Her fingers smooth his hair one more time before her lips press a kiss to his forehead. There are no more tears. There are no more protests. There’s no fight left for him.
It turns out, she’s right, then.
It’s over.
The darkness washes over him and all the rest fades.
He should know by now.
Some fights are really over before you even get started.
-o-
Across the hospital, the revelations are not as pointed, but they are just as telling. Sharon Goodwin has welcomed Jay Halstead into her office. She does it cordially, but admittedly, she feels some trepidation. At first, she’s wishing that Jay were a less biased source. The best she can figure, if she’s about to lay the blame on Dr. Halstead, a less partial police representative would be useful.
Her trepidation is warranted.
Not for the reasons she thinks.
“We need to talk about Emily Novak,” he says, forgoing most of the pleasantries.
Sharon is taken aback. “Emily Novak?”
“Your new ED nurse,” Jay reminds her. “Will says he’s been working with her closely.”
“Yes,” Sharon says, because there’s nothing to deny. “It’s a bit unusual to have a doctor mentoring a nurse, but she’s had some trouble fitting in, getting used to things. Dr. Choi thought they’d be a good fit.”
Jay seems uninterested in this explanation. “Will’s had doubts about her abilities, questioned her credentials,” he says.
Sharon wants to chuckle, but it seems ill advised. “It can be very hard when a doctor has so many patients die--”
“I know,” Jay says, and he’s clearly considered this, too. “I get it, Will’s not unbiased in this case. But I know my brother. He’s gone over this case -- all the cases -- and he can’t find anything he did wrong. All he could find was a nurse.”
“Emily Novak?” Sharon asks, now increasingly skeptical. “She came highly recommended.”
This is true, in a sense. There was one recommendation, and it wasn’t credentialed, but it was indeed high.
“Yeah, well, I found something else on her,” Jay says.
“Something?” Sharon asks, a little confused.
“A lot of something,” Jay clarifies, putting the file folder down on Sharon’s desk. She starts to open it, but Jay is already talking. “I started by following up at Michigan State, her alma mater. Turns out, there was a nursing student named Emily Novak, but it sure as hell wasn’t this girl. This Emily Novak only showed up on records two jobs ago, the home health aide and a critical care nurse at a clinic in Indiana.”
Sharon is scanning the documents, but none of it makes any sense. “But her resume--”
“Was crap,” Jay tells her flatly. “It was all lies. When I started chasing her aliases, it was pretty clear she’d been using one after another for years. She was Emily Lassiter in New York. When she was there, she went to a small college, worked for a year and even got married.”
Sharon doesn’t have any response.
Jay doesn’t seem to need one. “Then she showed up in Florida for a little bit,” he explains. “The name Emily Little, based on her husband. The guy died, though, less than two years into the relationship. In Florida, she had two jobs. And one of those was this hospital -- San Ricardo -- which got shut down after a series of unexplained patient deaths bankrupted the place.”
Sharon turns the page, and it just keeps getting worse.
“You’ve got Emily Hanson in Denver -- question over some mysterious deaths at an urgent care. There’s Emily Waddell in Montana -- actually wanted for murder in that one,” he explains, and then he points at the file. “That’s when Emily Novak shows up in Illinois. She worked in a clinic, then spent more than a year in home health care before she got the job at Med.”
It’s surreal, that’s what it is. Sharon is reading the pages, she’s listening to the detective, and she knows what it means. She knows what it means.
But there’s a part of her that’s stuck in denial.
Her throat is tight, and she swallows hard.
Jay continues. “It’s a clearly established pattern that I traced back a decade or more,” he says. “She assumes an alias of a licensed nurse and just takes over. The real Emily Novak? The one who went to Michigan State? She’s still in Michigan, staying at home with her kids. This woman -- whoever she is -- builds up a fake network of references and mostly applies to places desperate enough to hire her based on a CV alone.”
She turns to the last page of the file. She’s shaky as she looks up, adrenaline making her head feel light even as she meets the detective’s gaze. “And you’re telling me she’s a serial killer,” she says, forming the words slowly and quietly. “That she moves around, uses these aliases, to kill people?”
“Her patients,” Jay clarifies. He shrugs. “I don’t have a lot of concrete evidence for it or anything, but the trail is pretty convincing. I looked into each place she worked, and they all reported an upswing in deaths, just like here at Med.”
Sharon’s stomach falls. There are legal ramifications, and she knows that. But she thinks of the people who came through the ED doors. She thinks of their duty to treat them. She thinks of the trust they take for granted.
The trust they betrayed with Emily Novak working. Not just for a few days or weeks.
But months.
She could have been killing patients for months.
The scandal could bankrupt them.
But the emotional fallout for a lack of faith in Med will be even more devastating.
And part of it is her fault. For hiring her.
For not listening to the warning signs.
She looks at Detective Halstead, somewhat more focused. “Have you told your brother?”
“Not yet,” Jay says. “When I realized what she was doing -- what she was -- I knew stopping her was more important. That’s why I’m here.”
“Well, I do appreciate your diligence,” Sharon says, bustling to her feet. “Do you have a warrant?”
He waves it at her as he gets to his feet. “It’s just connected to the latest case. Like I said, the evidence so far is circumstantial.”
“Circumstantial or not, I need her out of my hospital,” Sharon says.
“You didn’t know?” Jay asks. “You didn’t have any idea?”
The questions stops her, and she hems herself in. “I had doubts, maybe,” she says. “The circumstances of her hiring were rushed, and Dr. Halstead has voiced his opinion on the matter a number of times.”
“And you didn’t do anything?” Jay presses. “I mean, if he’s with her all the time--”
“I know,” Sharon says shortly, because it’s a question she doesn’t particularly enjoy answering. “But your brother’s reputation has not been sterling lately. It’s not uncommon for a doctor to deflect blame when they are faced with high patient mortality rates.”
“But stealing trial meds -- that’s not the same thing,” Jay argues. “I mean, did you really think it was his fault?”
“I understand your personal investment in the question, and I will talk through these answers -- difficult as they are and damning as they may be,” she says with a shake of her head. “But you just told me we have a serial killer in the ED. I’d like to focus on that first, and then work on assigning blame -- and taking my share of it -- later.”
Jay seems to find that answer acceptable. He stands back and nods. “Well, we just need to find Will, right?” he says. “Will says they’re practically joined at the hip.”
Sharon sighs. There seems to be no shortage of bad news here. “They usually are,” she concedes. “But I’m afraid I sent Dr. Halstead home for today.”
Jay frowns, brow furrowing. “What?”
“He’s been somewhat emotional at work lately,” she says. “I had reason to question his judgement at the time. Obviously, in light of new information, I might have proceeded differently.”
Jay is clearly annoyed, but he’s enough of a professional to see the bigger picture. He scowls at her, drawing his lips to a thin line, but he shakes his head. “Fine,” he says. “First things first. Emily.”
Sharon nods in sober agreement. “Emily.”
And they make their way to the door together.
-o-
The trip down to the ED is not particularly long, but it seems to take ages today. The elevator seems to chug slower than usual, as it hems and haws at each floor. She’s anxious; next to her, gun still holstered and warrant stuffed in his back pocket, Jay Halstead seems to be more anxious.
She’s worried about her hospital, her patient.
No doubt, he’s worried about a potentially dangerous suspect.
He’s also probably worried about his brother.
No matter. Sharon has no moral high ground to stand on here. Not when she okayed the hire. Not when she ignored Dr. Halstead’s worries. Not when she should have known what was happening in her own damn ED.
This is the kind of case that compromises all of them.
When they get there, she goes straight for Ethan. “Where’s Emily Novak?” she asks.
Ethan seems surprised, maybe not by the request but by the intensity of it. “Um, I don’t know,” he says. “You could check with Will--”
That’s exactly the wrong thing to say. Jay tenses by her side, and Sharon stays firmly planted in front of him. “Dr. Halstead left for the day at my request,” she says, neatly skipping over the contentious parts of how that happened. The last thing she needs is to give Jay Halstead more reason to be trigger happy.
Ethan frowns at this, clearly disconcerted. “But I saw Will and Emily go off together,” he says. “Some kind of emergency upstairs. I guess that’s why Emily came back alone.”
“Wait, what emergency?” Jay asks, stepping around Sharon now. “What the hell are you talking about?”
Ethan still clearly has no way to make sense of the sudden scrutiny here. “Something about one of the construction zones. The fourth floor maybe?” he says. “Normally, I wouldn’t send someone who was so new to the floor on a house call, but Will’s been her mentor here. I figured I could trust the two of them together to handle it.”
Jay is practically seething now, and Sharon just barely has enough control to intercede. “And you’re sure there was a call?” she asks. “Did you verify with Maggie?”
This idea has not occurred to Ethan. And there’s no reason it would. Ethan was the head of the ED, but the daily operations were more likely to run through Maggie’s say-so than his. “I guess not. I was going to ask Will about it later.”
“And they left together?” Jay asks.
Sharon holds up her hand to slow him down. “How long has Emily been back?” she asks.
Ethan can only shrug. “Maybe five minutes,” he says.
“And where is she exactly?” Sharon presses.
“Probably with a patient,” Ethan says. “She was working on the woman in two. But what is this about?”
Jay is already moving, but Sharon takes him by the arm and lowers her voice. “Something bad,” she advises him gently. “You may want to come.”
Want is probably the wrong term. Need is more appropriate, but the look on Sharon’s face tells of the gravity her words have formed.
-o-
Sharon has to hurry to keep up. Jay Halstead isn’t a staff member of the ED, but he is what you might call a frequent flyer. From his investigations to his own penchant for mishaps, he knows right where exam two is. And he wastes no time barging in.
The movement startles the patient, who is talk to Emily. Emily has a chair pulled up to the patient’s side, and she gets up, as if ready to protect her. She looks concerned when she sees Jay, but when she sees Sharon and Ethan, she just looks confused.
“Emily Novak,” Jay says, voice nearly dripping with vitriol as he says the stolen last name. “I need you to come with me.”
Emily still looks startled, eyes flitting from Jay to her boss.
Sharon steps up beside him in a show of solidarity. “Emily, this is Detective Halstead,” she explains. “He has a few questions he’d like to ask you.”
Emily moves slowly, glancing back down at the woman. She’s elderly; she looks upset by the intrusion.
“Ma’am, it’s nothing for you to worry about,” she says. “I’ll have another nurse look in on your right away.”
“But Edith is my patient,” Emily starts to protest.
Ethan steps forward as well before Jay can really start to growl. “Emily, please,” he says. “I’ll have Doris check in.”
“Not Doris,” Emily says, shaking her head. She smiles back at the patient. “But maybe Faith? Faith’s very sweet, Edith. You’ll like her.”
Sharon looks from Emily to Ethan, giving him the slightest nod. It obviously took all of Jay’s self control not to drag out of the room with all unnecessary force.
And it took all of Sharon’s not to let him.
-o-
For all that Sharon was the one to hire Emily, she admittedly has spent very little time with her. There had been a few perfunctory meet and greets, but Sharon was a busy woman and Emily had not been the type to seek out her superiors. Sharon had attributed that to shyness before.
Clearly, that had been a mistake.
Now face to face with Emily Novak, she immediately senses what Will Halstead has been trying to tell them all since the beginning. There’s something not right about Emily.
She looks the part well enough. She’s wearing the right clothes, and she has the right demeanor. She’s got training, because she knows her way around an ED, but she doesn’t act like the other nurses. When she looks you in the eyes, it doesn’t feel right.
At all.
Is Sharon projecting?
Possibly.
But this woman has killed at least one person in her hospital, probably more. It’s going to be pretty hard not to project.
Fortunately, getting Emily out of the patient’s room was the extent of her job at the moment. The second Sharon had them secured in a conference room, the show is all Jay’s.
“Is your name Emily Novak?” the detective asks, voice heavy with contempt.
There’s genuine hesitation on Emily’s face, and her gaze skirts imploringly to Sharon. “Yes.”
“Were you involved with the treatment of a Edwin Garside?”
“Ed?” she asks without hesitation. Her face seems to brighten. “Of course I was. Ed was great. He actually got his start as a farmer, but when his farm went bankrupt, he started over from scratch. Taught himself the trade, moved to the city, became an electrician. Worked for ten years in an apprenticeship with kids half his age before finally starting his own business.”
She sounds almost fond, and it’s disconcerting. The detail she remembers.
Most doctors will remember the case statistics.
She’s reciting his life story.
Her sweet smile returns, and it’s more unsettling than before. “I had such a great time with him. He told me all about his kids, his grandkids. He hated how his condition was limiting his ability to spend time with them. He was so worried about becoming a burden.”
The train of logic seems benign on the surface, but Sharon is starting to understand it. Emily -- no matter what her last name is -- is a real nurse. She has real training, and her compassion for patients is based on some semblance of reality.
But she’s an angel of mercy.
She fancies herself as a do-gooder.
By killing her suffering patients, she thinks she’s saving them. That’s how she can stand there and wax poetic about a man she’s killed.
This is numbing to Sharon.
Jay’s mouth twists with barely contained aggression. “You’re wanted on suspicion of murder,” he says. “For your involvement in the death of Edwin Garside.”
She scoffs, as if it is actually a shock. “Murder? But -- how?”
She looks between Jay and Sharon again, even more at a loss.
Sharon feels sick. Jay shakes his head, face twisted even more vehemently than before. “Don’t even,” he says. “Unless you want to tell me how you did it, I don’t want to hear it.”
Her mouth falls open. “But I don’t understand. I care for my patients. Deeply so. Ask anyone. Ask Edith.”
“More like someone should run a tox screen on Edith just to be sure,” Jay snarks. He shakes his head. “I know you’re not really Emily Novak.”
“What?” she says, incredulous now. “Ms. Goodwin, I don’t understand.”
“Just answer the question,” Sharon says, pressing her lips together to keep herself together.
“What question?” she asks, shrugging her shoulders helplessly. “I’m Emily Novak--”
“And Emily Little?” Jay presses. “Emily Lassiter? New York, Florida, Denver--”
The color drains from her face, just so. “This is ridiculous,” she protests. She sounds convincing -- almost.
Almost.
But not quite.
“If there’s something you’d like to confess, now’s the time to do it,” Sharon says. “Because we will be launching a full review of every case you’ve been involved with, starting with Mr. Garside but not ending there.”
At this, she looks bereft. “I care for my patients,” she says, nearly insisting now. She gives a short little laugh. “I care for them more than anyone else in this hospital.”
“Look, you can say whatever you want, but you’re still under arrest,” Jay says. He moves across toward her, handcuffs out. He reaches for her, taking her by the arm and turning her around. “You have the right to remain silent.”
She squawks, the sound a cut-off cry as the cuffs go on, and she’s still shaking her head. “This is crazy! Ms. Goodwin, tell him that this is crazy. Look at my record. My patients notes. Dr. Halstead--”
“Is the one who tipped us off to your involvement,” Sharon says, lest the mention of Jay’s brother’s name sets him off. Jay has her cuffed now, and he turns her back around to face them. “Where is he, anyway? Dr. Choi says you were seen with him.”
Her guise has been good so far, believable. But Sharon sees something shift. A moment of calculator, however small, but Sharon feels its impact with a dreadful inevitability.
She knows something.
She knows everything.
Part of her believes her own story, that much is clear.
But another part of her -- however small -- knows who she is and what she’s doing.
“Dr. Halstead?” she repeats, the veil of sweetness somehow returning. “I saw him leave not twenty minutes ago. He was acting funny, though. Not really himself.”
It’s not the right thing to say, not with Jay Halstead in the room. She’s underestimating that family connection. He shoves her, just barely restraining his rage. “Don’t lie to us,” he snaps. “We know you went off with him.”
Her face contorts. “But why would I lie?” she asks, imploring Sharon once more. “Ms. Goodwin, my record here at Med has been unimpeachable.”
That’s not a tactic that’s going to work, but Sharon needs to play the level-headed one here. “Just answer the question, Emily,” she says shortly. “Where is Dr. Halstead?”
The display of emotion dials back slightly, and Sharon sees a glimpse of a grittier, more unsettling resolve. “I saw him on the stairs, going up. He was by himself,” she says, and she sounds so certain that Sharon suspects it’s some approximation of the truth. She has the audacity to lift her chin with a display of confidence. “I swear. That’s the truth. I saw him upstairs.”
“Fine,” Jay grits out. He grabs her by the arm, dragging her gruffly forward. He looks at Sharon. “Do you have a security team I can borrow?”
She nods, already on her way out the door to grab them.
“I want her watched, and someone call Intelligence for back up. Tell Voight it’s an emergency,” he orders, just a step behind Sharon with Emily in tow. “Because I’m going to find my brother.”
-o-
Security secures Emily, who protests the entire time in the lounge. A crowd is gathering, questions are being asked, and Sharon calls Hank Voight herself to ensure that backup is on the way. Jay Halstead calls Will’s phone, but it rings and rings and rings.
No answer.
“Where would they go?” Jay asks, jaw stiff as he looks at Sharon. “If she took him upstairs, some unused part of the hospital, where would they go?”
Sharon takes a steadying breath. “He might have gone home,” she suggests cautiously. “If he’s driving or if he’s on the train--”
Jay shakes his head, because he knows better, and he’s not willing to stomach the optimistic what-ifs. “Where?” he demands.
“Sixth floor,” she says, and the words taste like ash in her mouth. “It’s the only area of the hospital currently under construction. If she was looking for an unoccupied place in the hospital, that’s the only place she could go.”
That’s all Jay needs to hear, and he’s off. She takes Ethan by the arm, tells him to grab a bag just in case, and Sharon follows just a step behind.
-o-
Ethan likes to think of himself as prepared. Honestly, that’s always been one of those selling features he used to boast about during admission interviews. He’s always prepared.
It’s a facade, though, and he’s propped it up meticulously since he’s been back at work. As if getting shot is just the kind of thing you can roll with.
The joke’s on Ethan, though. He’s not prepared.
Not for how hard each day is.
Not for the demands of the ED.
But Ms. Goodwin tells him to grab his gear, and Jay Halstead looks as serious as Ethan’s ever seen him.
“What is it?” he asks, even as he keeps step. They’re bypassing the elevator, taking the stairs. Up. “Where are we going? Has there been an accident?”
Jay doesn’t answer, but he increases his pace so he’s moving two at a time. Ms. Goodwin is going as fast as she can, and she looks at Ethan grimly. “I hope not,” she says. “But at this point, we need to be prepared for the possibility.”
The possibility.
But of what?
Ethan shakes his head. “What happened, though?”
Ahead of them, Jay is nearly a floor above them, turning out of sight up another staircase. “It’s a long story,” Ms. Goodwin provides, starting to breathe heavily as she tries to keep up.
“One that ends with Emily being arrested?” Ethan asks, because trying to be scant on the details doesn’t work when there’s that fact staring them both in the face.
Ms. Goodwin snorts. “We can hope that’s the end of it, but right now, I’m not actually convinced.”
She’s being vague, and in a rather dire kind of way. It’s not like her, to be honest. She’s a realist, and she’s a strong believer in their ability to address any problem adequately.
Right now, however, she is bordering on fatalistic.
Ethan’s heart rate is quickening, and it’s not just because of the physical exertion of climbing the stairs. “Arrest, though?” he asks. “For what?”
She looks at him, even more sober than before. “Murder.”
She says it just like that, matter of fact, putting it out there. Ethan doesn’t dare slow his pace, but his stomach drops down and he feels suddenly quite nauseated. “Murder? You mean the Garside case?”
It’s the only open investigation he knows about right now, though he hadn’t thought it had officially been declared anything. In the ED, it’s not uncommon to work with the police on murder cases -- wrongful death, manslaughter, assault and the like. But Ms. Goodwin isn’t talking about the latest gang shootout. She’s not talking about an unfortunate domestic dispute or workplace roiling.
Truthfully, Ethan doesn’t know what she’s talking about.
His confusion is heightened as she turns the corner to make her way up another flight of stairs toward their destination to the construction zone. “And more.”
His feet stop, just for a moment, and he has to double his pace to catch back up with her. “More? Ms. Goodwin, I don’t understand what you mean. What is going on here?”
This time, she pulls to a stop. Jay is far ahead of them by now, but they still hear the sound of his feet on the cement. But Ms. Goodwin draws a breath and meets his gaze fully. “I’m going to be honest with you. I’m not sure I understand this situation fully myself, but I know it’s a lot more serious than any of us have allowed ourselves to possibly believe. We need to find Dr. Halstaed. Now.”
She’s making it sound even more dire now, but Ethan feels like he’s still not putting the pieces together. “Will? But why? What does he have to do with any of this.”
She inhales deeply and shakes her head. “Because it’s Emily. He’s been telling us for months that there’s something going on with her, and we all dismissed him. And now? Now, he’s missing, and she’s the last one who saw him.”
Ethan grapples with the implication, because he knows what it seems like she’s saying, but he can’t possibly make that parse. That Emily is wanted for murder. That Will--
That Will--
Ethan shakes head head, brow set more deeply than before. “I thought you sent him home.”
Ms. Goodwin nods. “Let’s just hope he made it there.”
Then, a few floors up, they hear a yell. It’s inaudible at first, somewhere between a cry and an exclamation. Then, Jay’s voice echoes down. “I found him! I found him!”
This time, Ethan leads the way, because somehow he knows, as fast as he can go is not going to be fast enough.
-o-
At the right floor, Ethan flings the door open. Ms. Goodwin has fallen somewhat behind, and he doesn’t bother to wait for her or hold the door. He charges inside, trying to get his bearings as quickly as he can. He’s been on this floor before, of course, but it’d been closed down six months ago for impending renovations. The process had stalled out -- something from the construction crew about delays due to COVID -- and it hadn’t been occupied all this time. It’s technically a construction zone, but it’s mostly abandoned. The work hasn’t really been started yet, but it’s dim and dingy with disuse.
Inside, it’s not hard to find Jay. He’s no more than fifteen feet from the exit near the old nurse’s station. It’s one of the older departments left in the hospital -- which is why it’d been flagged for renovation -- and the plan had been to create a more welcoming, open layout.
Even so, Ethan has a clear view forward.
He sees Jay on his hands and knees.
He’s lying next to something.
Someone.
The body laid out prone on the ground takes a minute to register. It’s until he’s right behind Jay that he recognizes the tall figure and the shock of red hair.
It’s Will.
Jay is leaned over his brother, fingers pressed to his neck. He shakes his head, leaning down to put his ear next to Will’s mouth. “I have a pulse,” he says. “But I can’t tell if he’s breathing.”
He sits up, looking at Ethan with a frantic desperation he’s never seen in the cop before.
“Why the hell isn’t he breathing?” Jay demands.
It’s a good question, and it’s not one Ethan can answer. He stands, for a moment still shellshocked at the scene in front of him, but then he remembers he’s the one with a medical license and a doctor’s kit in his hand.
“Okay,” he says, galvanized into action. Context doesn’t matter in an emergency -- not really. That’s why Dean saving his life is still important to him. You save the life. As a doctor, you always, always save the life. “Let me see.”
He steps around Will, going to his knees on the doctor’s other side. Jay is watching him, and Ethan does his best not to notice. He reaches down, checking the pulse. It’s there, just like Jay says. But it’s fast, thready. It’s irregular.
He tries not to frown as he bends over. He needs to get a portable monitor set up, but it’s clear that Will’s not moving enough air to make a difference. He’s going to need artificial breathing support at least until they get him stabilized.
Sitting up, he gives Jay a passing glance. “I’m going to help Will, Jay -- I am, but I could use a hand,” he says. “Can you do rescue breathing? Just until we get the gear out.”
Jay’s not a doctor, but he’s not a novice. As a cop, he’d have some first aid training, and he knows Jay to be competent. He’s hoping that he can hold it together -- especially with his brother’s life on the line.
Jay’s gone colorless but he nods.
“Just steady, even breaths,” Ethan coaches, getting his bag open. Jay leans down. “Pinch the nose, tilt the chin -- that’s it.”
He watches as Jay opens the airway, easily blowing in a breath of air. Ethan watches for a moment, and Will’s chest rises and falls. Airway obstruction is out, then. That’s one less thing to worry about, but given the host of other problems, Ethan’s pretty sure he shouldn’t start celebrating yet.
He gets out the trauma scissors first, neatly slicing up the front of Will’s scrubs. Jay watches while he breathes for his brother, Will’s exposed chest still rising and falling at Jay’s command. Next, Ethan unloads the monitor, hastily readying the electrodes. As he starts positioning them on Will’s chest, Ms. Goodwin catches up with him. She makes a small, strangled noise before going to her knees at Will’s head, looking at Ethan stoically. “What can I do?”
“We need to get a better read on his vitals,” Ethan says, hooking up the next electrode. He reaches over to turn on the device and rummages for the pulse-ox monitor. “But he’s not moving air. If you can bag him--”
He doesn’t have to ask. Ms. Goodwin is already securing the bag, setting it up correctly and placing the mouth piece to Will’s lips. She starts squeezes, steady, even compressions.
This gives Ethan the freedom to conduct a more thorough assessment and start getting his bearings on the situation at hand. With the electrodes in place, the monitor goes live, and Ethan starts getting his first look at Will’s vitals.
It’s not what he expects.
But then again, none of this is anything that he’s expected.
Ms. Goodwin’s face is set hard and long. Jay has gone white, and his eyes are wide and terrified.
Ethan double checks the vitals -- pulse, heart rate, oxygen levels, blood pressure.
And grimaces.
He recognizes the readings, but in the context, they don’t make sense. None of this makes sense, and Ethan is torn between being the doctor he’s trained to be and the friend he feels like. He shakes his head, because the line of vitals don’t change. He can’t will his way out of this one.
“I think he’s having a heart attack,” he says finally, giving in to the truth.
Somehow, on her knees on the other side of Will, squeezing the bag, Ms. Goodwin doesn’t look surprised. Her expression is terse, and her fingers don’t miss a pulse with the bag. “We need a full cardiac workup, and we need to run the extended tox screen -- checking for everything we can think of,” she says readily. “We better have cardiology meet us down there.”
“Whoa, wait, Jay says. He’s on his feet now, pacing back and forth in front of them when he comes to a stop. “He’s having a heart attack? But how?”
Ethan’s stomach flips, and he doesn’t have an answer as he sets up for an IV. He’d brought a larger medical kit, and he’s glad. Will needs the line ASAP.
Ethan’s the doctor here, but Ms. Goodwin’s on point. She’s still bagging, sure and steady, and her eyes lift toward Jay. “That’s a question to answer later,” she says. “Right now, I need you on your phone and calling down to the ED. Tell them we have a code on the sixth floor, and I want a gurney, crash cart and full medical team. Now.”
If Jay has any hesitations, they dissipate instantly. Because the portable monitor shows something else, something that none of them need Ethan to diagnose. “He’s crashing,” he announces anyway, lining himself to get in position as Will’s heart gives out. He’s doing compressions before anyone has a chance to react, pressing down hard and fast on Will’s breastbone, watching as his body jerks under the ministrations.
It’s a sobering reality, and it’s an incontrovertible one. Jay responds by making the call, face almost translucent now as he dials. Sharon reaches for the bag. “Do you have epi?” she asks quietly. She’s trying not to make a scene -- or a bigger scene -- but they both know how serious this is.
“I should,” he says, not yielding in his compressions. He has to compress the heart; he has to keep the blood pumping. If blood doesn’t get to Will’s brain, to his other internal organs, then he’s never getting off the sixth floor. “We need to run it, 5 ccs.”
It’s a rote order, and Ms. Goodwin has been a practicing nurse for years, but she still remembers. Putting the bag down for a moment, she reaches for the medical pack, rifling through its content until she pulls out the right vial and a fresh syringe. She doesn’t say anything else as she pushes it into the IV line, running it straight into Will’s bloodstream.
Ethan is still pressing on Will’s chest as she picks up the bag and starts squeezing it again. “He could use a tube,” she mutters, almost to herself.
Ethan responds anyway -- because he’s having the same thought. “No time. The priority is the heart. Then, we secure the airway.”
He pauses, looking at the monitor. “Okay, v-fib,” he says. “We can shock him.”
If there were a full medical team on hand, this would go faster, but Ethan will work with what he has. He picks up the defibrillator, easily placing it on Will’s chest. He glances up, making eye contact with his boss. “Clear.”
She says nothing but puts the bag down, holding up her hands to show that she’s not making contact with Will.
Jay looks like he’s about to be sick behind them.
Ethan can’t worry about that, though. The device is set to 200, and Ethan presses it down, letting the charge go. Will convulses just slightly, his body jerking and going still. Ms. Goodwin is already reaching for the bag while Ethan watches the readout.
With relief. “Okay, his pulse is back,” he says.
Relief, though, is short lived. And in context, Ethan knows it’s not entirely warranted. Will’s got a pulse, but he’s still not moving air -- and he’s still having a heart attack.
“I don’t like his oxygen levels,” Ms. Goodwin says, even as she presses the bag again. “Have you checked his reflexes?”
Ethan does so, going through the quick checklist and finding Will only marginally responsive. “He’s not doing a good job at protecting his airway,” he says. “I brought the intubation kit.”
It’s a lucky foresight. Planning for anything means planning for the unlikely. You don’t take a bullet and not learn that lesson. You don’t fire your mentor and not take that lesson utterly to heart.
He grapples through the kit, trying to harness the adrenaline surging through him even while it threatens to overwhelm him. His fingers are just shy of shaking, but he grabs the kit and pulls it out. He’s overcome all the odds for himself to get here. He’ll overcome a few more for Will’s sake.
He spares a glance at his coworker -- his friend. His right-hand man, really. Life in the ED wouldn’t be possible without Will, and Ethan’s not naive. He knows he’s only making it by as chief because Will’s played second fiddle so impeccably since his fall from grace. It’s painful for both of them how they got here, but they’ve been better off for it.
Ethan gets the tube out, moving around to be behind Will’s head and get better visualization of the airway.
He really hopes they’re still better for it when this is all said and done.
Mindful of Will’s teeth, he has to adjust the airway one more time. Once he sees the cords, he guides the tube in, letting it slide over Will’s tongue seamlessly, and threading it past the throat’s anatomy until he feels the proper placement. As Ms. Goodwin reattaches the bag to the end of the tube, he takes out the stethoscope, listening to Will’s chest as the oxygen is moved once more. With the sound of the lungs, he can tell the tube is placed correctly. The oxygen levels start to rise once more.
Then, from behind them, there’s fresh clatter. Ethan is startled for a moment, but Jay is jogging back toward them with a small sound of relief. Ethan hears the familiar sound of a gurney being pushed across linoleum, and he looks up in time to see a full medical team responding.
The response time is fast.
He looks back down at Will, whose waxy complexion and still features make a strong case that it might not have been fast enough.
-o-
It’s been years since Sharon was a practicing nurse, but there are some skills you don’t forget. Some are just too palpable, too tied to emotion. That overwhelming sensation when you hold a life in your hands -- the surge of adrenaline will always bring her back.
And no matter what they tell you in training, medicine is always personal. You always feel connections to patients, and you always feel the weight of their injuries as your own. It’s impossible to do this job and not feel it, though you can learn to manage it.
Sharon’s out of practice, unfortunately.
And this time, it’s one of her own.
Her hands had squeezed oxygen into the lungs of one of her doctors. She’d saved the live of one of her employees. Will Halstead, for better or for worse, is her responsibility, and she stands there, watching as he’s loaded up on a gurney and redlined down to the ED.
He’s alive, but that doesn’t feel like much comfort. Life and death is always a precarious thing in the ED, and these days, it’s even worse. The pandemic has been its own killer, directly and indirectly, and now a serial killer? On top of everything else?
There are just no breaks to be had, it seems. Not for her.
Not for Dr. Halstead, it seems.
She watches as he is loaded up, her care being replaced by an entire team. They all looked confused and shellshocked, but they’re professionals. They’ll have questions later, to be sure, but they’ll keep to the task at hand first.
The questions, though, are Sharon’s most pressing concern. Glancing over, she sees Jay Halstead still planted at her side. He seems frozen and transfixed, and she’s sure that he’s in as much shock as his brother at the moment. Only his can’t be treated with fluids and medications.
Jay doesn’t look at her, not even as the elevator doors slide shut and his brother is whisked from view. “Is he going to die?” he asks, voice thin. “Did she kill him?”
Sharon is not one for platitudes, and she knows he’s not the kind of man who wants them, even if part of him craves them. “I don’t know,” she admits. “He’s in very serious condition.”
He closes his eyes, as if that notion is ludicrous enough to amuse him. He shakes his head again, and he looks at her. “Can they save him?”
The pressure under his gaze is intense, but she lacks the luxury of looking away. “Again, I don’t know. It will depend on what she did to him.”
“And what did she do to him?” he asks, voice hinging with emotion now, ratcheting upward.
“I don’t know,” she says simply. “I didn’t know until an hour ago that she was even a threat. None of the deaths have been flagged by any of our normal processes or pathology tests. Whatever she’s doing -- whatever concoctions she’s employing -- she’s picking them carefully to fly under the radar. I’m sure that’s how she manages to stay under the radar.”
She’s using reason and logic, which would normally appeal to a detective like Jay. Today, however, he seems to have no patience for it. “And what if we don’t know what she did?”
Sharon sighs, because it’s something she’s tried not to think about -- tried, and failed. “It’ll make it harder to treat him,” she says. “Medications can have different impacts, and they have to be counteracted carefully. We can’t target the problem with the right solution unless we know what we’re looking at it. We’ll run the most complex tox screen we have, but some medications are simply harder to track.”
She’s telling him the reasons.
All the reasons why his brother might still die.
Jay knows this.
He knows this.
He breaths, standing rigidly next to her. He tightens and loosens his jaw, and she watches as he seems to come to some kind of resolution. “There’s one person who will know.”
Sharon’s eyebrows go up at the implication. “Can we question her if she’s not in custody?”
Jay’s look is withering. “If it saves Will’s life--”
Sharon nods; she understands. “--then it’s worth it.”
PART TWO
PART THREE
PART FOUR
PART FIVE
PART SIX
PART SEVEN
PART EIGHT
PART NINE
PART TEN
-o-
By the time they reach the floor, Will is moderately breathless. Taking the stairs briskly is taxing, but really, it’s the adrenaline of the moment. The rush is stronger than normal, given the day he’s had, and he finds he’s only able to focus on so much at a time. Just save the life, he tells himself. Worry about the rest later. Save the life.
If he can just do that, then it’s something.
It's something.
He’s so focused on something that he doesn’t notice anything until they come out of the stairwell into the floor. The ward has been cleared out, and much of it is draped with protective covers. Some equipment is still there, but the place has been mostly abandoned due to pandemic related delays. It’s dim; it’s quiet.
It’s empty.
Why would it be empty?
Emily comes to a stop in front of him, and Will pulls up short, utterly at a loss. “Where’s the patient?” he asks, fumbling with bewilderment.
“Oh, Dr. Halstead,” she says, somewhat slowly now. She turns toward him. She’s smiling. “You don’t get it, do you?”
He shakes his head. “Get what?” he asks, and he turns around, still searching for the patient in need. He looks around blankly. “Is it a construction worker? Emily, there’s no one here--”
He hears her move closer to him, but as he turns toward her, he feels something prick his upper arm. It’s a brief sting, and he hisses in surprise, pulling back in sudden shock. He looks down, first at the needle hanging out of his bicep, and then at Emily, who is watching him back intently.
“You are the patient, Dr. Halstead,” she says with a terrifying sincerity. “It’s you.”
Gaping, he can only watch as the needle slides out from the skin. He blinks at it dumbly as he realizes that it’s been fully emptied. Whatever was in it is not coursing through his system.
WIth that realization, he feels it. His heart thuds in his chest noisily as a wave of adrenaline washes over him like a bucketful of ice water. His ears start to ring, and his vision zones out. He feels a heady emotion up and down his spine before the numbness sets in from his extremities.
By the time he feels it, leaching into his chest, he’s already on his knees.
And his heart stutters. His lungs seize.
He’s collapsing the rest of the way before he even understands what’s happening to him.
She catches him neatly, easing him back. His legs are still folded awkwardly beneath him as she cradles his upper body. She pauses for a moment, smiling that sickeningly sweet smile of hers as she arranges his limbs. She pulls his legs out from under him before positioning his arms more comfortably over his chest. She flits her fingers through his hair with a small, self satisfied nod. “See? That’s better,” she muses, smoothing his hair back from his forehead. She looks him over once more. “You don’t have to worry about a thing, okay? I used a paralytic -- completely safe and totally effective. I’ve got the dosage just right for your body mass so it’s fast and efficient in getting the job done. You won’t feel anything. It’s just as easy as going to sleep.”
His mind reels even as his body shuts down. The horror is hard to grasp, but the meaning is starting to become clear.
“Hush,” she says, looking somewhat distressed. “Why are you struggling? You don’t need to struggle, Dr. Halstead. That’s all over now. It’s all done. I’m giving you respite. Take it. Just take it.”
Respite. As easy as going to sleep.
She’s going to--
She’s--
Will panics as he comes to the conclusion he can’t avoid. She’s killing him, just like she’s killed all the other patients. An effective concoction of drugs to make swift, painless and almost impossible to trace unless you know what you’re looking for. That’s why none of the cases have made sense. They haven’t been looking for the right things. It’s a trail you have to want to find, and it’s a trail that’s circulating right now in Will’s slowing bloodstream.
She shuts the body down.
Then she stops the heart.
It looks like a heart attack.
No one knows it’s murder.
The darkness is coming closer, and he feels the weight start to lay heavy on his body. He can’t move his limbs anymore, and the mere motion of speaking requires all the focus he has. “Why?” he asks, the sound nothing more than a croak.
Her brow creases, her fingers lingering in his hair. “I really wish you wouldn’t struggle,” she soothes, fingers carding once more through his hair. “I’ve seen you, Dr. Halstead. I’ve seen how truly unhappy you are.”
He takes a staggering breath, but his lungs are contracting less and less. He can feel the faltering beat of his heart even as she smiles. Her fingers cup his cheek, and this time, his voice fails him and he exerts all his effort on breathing instead.
“That’s no way to live, trying and failing -- always failing,” she says emphatically. “But you don’t have to suffer, not anymore. You’ve been so kind to me, so dedicated, so this is the best I can do to return the favor. I promise you, the suffering is over. You don’t have to feel that way, not anymore.”
The paralytic is strong, but his eyes widen as she unsheaths another needle. She trains this one at the crook of his arm, sliding it in right where an IV would go. His mind screams, but there’s nothing he can do as she injects it easily into his bloodstream.
He’s already numb from the paralytic, but it lances like a fire up and down his spine. There’s a momentary sensation of warm in his arm that races to his heart and settles hard and fast like a weight.
His heart stutters.
He feels it as the contraction falters, the chambers falling out of rhythm nearly instantly. The heart muscle rebels, but between the second medication and the paralytics, there’s nothing to be done. He feels the heart attack as it starts, seizing up his chest and closing his throat the rest of the way. Lights explode behind his eyes, and his mouth falls open. There’s no air, though. There’s no more movement. The spike of adrenaline is only momentary, and the cascading failures in his body overwhelm him, and he stares stupidly up at her.
She shushes him again, lifting him up closer until she’s cradling his head more securely. Her fingers trace over his face and into his hair. He’s going cold again, and things begin to fade. He thinks of the ED several floors below, going on like everything is normal. They need to know -- not about him, but her. They need to know about her.
Jay is going to be so, so mad at him.
But no one else will be disappointed. They’re already expecting the worst. No one else will miss him.
“See?” she asks, lulling him now. “That’s better now. That’s better. It’s almost over. You don’t have to prove yourself now. It’s almost done now.”
His eyes burn but no tears come. His throat seizes but no words are formed. He’s panicking, the last vestiges of his willpower before the drugs roll over him one more time and the paralysis is complete. His heart thuds dully in his chest, slower and slower.
She smiles, like this is their little secret. It dies with him.
“It’s okay, Dr. Halstead,” she soothes one more time. “I’ve taken care of everything for you. Just close your eyes. Just go to sleep.”
He has no choice but to obey, her fingers flicking over his face and drawing his eyelids shut.
His heart resounds, one last marker of his life. He’s sorry, then. He’s so, so sorry.
He feels her, only vaguely, as she lowers him to the ground. Her fingers smooth his hair one more time before her lips press a kiss to his forehead. There are no more tears. There are no more protests. There’s no fight left for him.
It turns out, she’s right, then.
It’s over.
The darkness washes over him and all the rest fades.
He should know by now.
Some fights are really over before you even get started.
-o-
Across the hospital, the revelations are not as pointed, but they are just as telling. Sharon Goodwin has welcomed Jay Halstead into her office. She does it cordially, but admittedly, she feels some trepidation. At first, she’s wishing that Jay were a less biased source. The best she can figure, if she’s about to lay the blame on Dr. Halstead, a less partial police representative would be useful.
Her trepidation is warranted.
Not for the reasons she thinks.
“We need to talk about Emily Novak,” he says, forgoing most of the pleasantries.
Sharon is taken aback. “Emily Novak?”
“Your new ED nurse,” Jay reminds her. “Will says he’s been working with her closely.”
“Yes,” Sharon says, because there’s nothing to deny. “It’s a bit unusual to have a doctor mentoring a nurse, but she’s had some trouble fitting in, getting used to things. Dr. Choi thought they’d be a good fit.”
Jay seems uninterested in this explanation. “Will’s had doubts about her abilities, questioned her credentials,” he says.
Sharon wants to chuckle, but it seems ill advised. “It can be very hard when a doctor has so many patients die--”
“I know,” Jay says, and he’s clearly considered this, too. “I get it, Will’s not unbiased in this case. But I know my brother. He’s gone over this case -- all the cases -- and he can’t find anything he did wrong. All he could find was a nurse.”
“Emily Novak?” Sharon asks, now increasingly skeptical. “She came highly recommended.”
This is true, in a sense. There was one recommendation, and it wasn’t credentialed, but it was indeed high.
“Yeah, well, I found something else on her,” Jay says.
“Something?” Sharon asks, a little confused.
“A lot of something,” Jay clarifies, putting the file folder down on Sharon’s desk. She starts to open it, but Jay is already talking. “I started by following up at Michigan State, her alma mater. Turns out, there was a nursing student named Emily Novak, but it sure as hell wasn’t this girl. This Emily Novak only showed up on records two jobs ago, the home health aide and a critical care nurse at a clinic in Indiana.”
Sharon is scanning the documents, but none of it makes any sense. “But her resume--”
“Was crap,” Jay tells her flatly. “It was all lies. When I started chasing her aliases, it was pretty clear she’d been using one after another for years. She was Emily Lassiter in New York. When she was there, she went to a small college, worked for a year and even got married.”
Sharon doesn’t have any response.
Jay doesn’t seem to need one. “Then she showed up in Florida for a little bit,” he explains. “The name Emily Little, based on her husband. The guy died, though, less than two years into the relationship. In Florida, she had two jobs. And one of those was this hospital -- San Ricardo -- which got shut down after a series of unexplained patient deaths bankrupted the place.”
Sharon turns the page, and it just keeps getting worse.
“You’ve got Emily Hanson in Denver -- question over some mysterious deaths at an urgent care. There’s Emily Waddell in Montana -- actually wanted for murder in that one,” he explains, and then he points at the file. “That’s when Emily Novak shows up in Illinois. She worked in a clinic, then spent more than a year in home health care before she got the job at Med.”
It’s surreal, that’s what it is. Sharon is reading the pages, she’s listening to the detective, and she knows what it means. She knows what it means.
But there’s a part of her that’s stuck in denial.
Her throat is tight, and she swallows hard.
Jay continues. “It’s a clearly established pattern that I traced back a decade or more,” he says. “She assumes an alias of a licensed nurse and just takes over. The real Emily Novak? The one who went to Michigan State? She’s still in Michigan, staying at home with her kids. This woman -- whoever she is -- builds up a fake network of references and mostly applies to places desperate enough to hire her based on a CV alone.”
She turns to the last page of the file. She’s shaky as she looks up, adrenaline making her head feel light even as she meets the detective’s gaze. “And you’re telling me she’s a serial killer,” she says, forming the words slowly and quietly. “That she moves around, uses these aliases, to kill people?”
“Her patients,” Jay clarifies. He shrugs. “I don’t have a lot of concrete evidence for it or anything, but the trail is pretty convincing. I looked into each place she worked, and they all reported an upswing in deaths, just like here at Med.”
Sharon’s stomach falls. There are legal ramifications, and she knows that. But she thinks of the people who came through the ED doors. She thinks of their duty to treat them. She thinks of the trust they take for granted.
The trust they betrayed with Emily Novak working. Not just for a few days or weeks.
But months.
She could have been killing patients for months.
The scandal could bankrupt them.
But the emotional fallout for a lack of faith in Med will be even more devastating.
And part of it is her fault. For hiring her.
For not listening to the warning signs.
She looks at Detective Halstead, somewhat more focused. “Have you told your brother?”
“Not yet,” Jay says. “When I realized what she was doing -- what she was -- I knew stopping her was more important. That’s why I’m here.”
“Well, I do appreciate your diligence,” Sharon says, bustling to her feet. “Do you have a warrant?”
He waves it at her as he gets to his feet. “It’s just connected to the latest case. Like I said, the evidence so far is circumstantial.”
“Circumstantial or not, I need her out of my hospital,” Sharon says.
“You didn’t know?” Jay asks. “You didn’t have any idea?”
The questions stops her, and she hems herself in. “I had doubts, maybe,” she says. “The circumstances of her hiring were rushed, and Dr. Halstead has voiced his opinion on the matter a number of times.”
“And you didn’t do anything?” Jay presses. “I mean, if he’s with her all the time--”
“I know,” Sharon says shortly, because it’s a question she doesn’t particularly enjoy answering. “But your brother’s reputation has not been sterling lately. It’s not uncommon for a doctor to deflect blame when they are faced with high patient mortality rates.”
“But stealing trial meds -- that’s not the same thing,” Jay argues. “I mean, did you really think it was his fault?”
“I understand your personal investment in the question, and I will talk through these answers -- difficult as they are and damning as they may be,” she says with a shake of her head. “But you just told me we have a serial killer in the ED. I’d like to focus on that first, and then work on assigning blame -- and taking my share of it -- later.”
Jay seems to find that answer acceptable. He stands back and nods. “Well, we just need to find Will, right?” he says. “Will says they’re practically joined at the hip.”
Sharon sighs. There seems to be no shortage of bad news here. “They usually are,” she concedes. “But I’m afraid I sent Dr. Halstead home for today.”
Jay frowns, brow furrowing. “What?”
“He’s been somewhat emotional at work lately,” she says. “I had reason to question his judgement at the time. Obviously, in light of new information, I might have proceeded differently.”
Jay is clearly annoyed, but he’s enough of a professional to see the bigger picture. He scowls at her, drawing his lips to a thin line, but he shakes his head. “Fine,” he says. “First things first. Emily.”
Sharon nods in sober agreement. “Emily.”
And they make their way to the door together.
-o-
The trip down to the ED is not particularly long, but it seems to take ages today. The elevator seems to chug slower than usual, as it hems and haws at each floor. She’s anxious; next to her, gun still holstered and warrant stuffed in his back pocket, Jay Halstead seems to be more anxious.
She’s worried about her hospital, her patient.
No doubt, he’s worried about a potentially dangerous suspect.
He’s also probably worried about his brother.
No matter. Sharon has no moral high ground to stand on here. Not when she okayed the hire. Not when she ignored Dr. Halstead’s worries. Not when she should have known what was happening in her own damn ED.
This is the kind of case that compromises all of them.
When they get there, she goes straight for Ethan. “Where’s Emily Novak?” she asks.
Ethan seems surprised, maybe not by the request but by the intensity of it. “Um, I don’t know,” he says. “You could check with Will--”
That’s exactly the wrong thing to say. Jay tenses by her side, and Sharon stays firmly planted in front of him. “Dr. Halstead left for the day at my request,” she says, neatly skipping over the contentious parts of how that happened. The last thing she needs is to give Jay Halstead more reason to be trigger happy.
Ethan frowns at this, clearly disconcerted. “But I saw Will and Emily go off together,” he says. “Some kind of emergency upstairs. I guess that’s why Emily came back alone.”
“Wait, what emergency?” Jay asks, stepping around Sharon now. “What the hell are you talking about?”
Ethan still clearly has no way to make sense of the sudden scrutiny here. “Something about one of the construction zones. The fourth floor maybe?” he says. “Normally, I wouldn’t send someone who was so new to the floor on a house call, but Will’s been her mentor here. I figured I could trust the two of them together to handle it.”
Jay is practically seething now, and Sharon just barely has enough control to intercede. “And you’re sure there was a call?” she asks. “Did you verify with Maggie?”
This idea has not occurred to Ethan. And there’s no reason it would. Ethan was the head of the ED, but the daily operations were more likely to run through Maggie’s say-so than his. “I guess not. I was going to ask Will about it later.”
“And they left together?” Jay asks.
Sharon holds up her hand to slow him down. “How long has Emily been back?” she asks.
Ethan can only shrug. “Maybe five minutes,” he says.
“And where is she exactly?” Sharon presses.
“Probably with a patient,” Ethan says. “She was working on the woman in two. But what is this about?”
Jay is already moving, but Sharon takes him by the arm and lowers her voice. “Something bad,” she advises him gently. “You may want to come.”
Want is probably the wrong term. Need is more appropriate, but the look on Sharon’s face tells of the gravity her words have formed.
-o-
Sharon has to hurry to keep up. Jay Halstead isn’t a staff member of the ED, but he is what you might call a frequent flyer. From his investigations to his own penchant for mishaps, he knows right where exam two is. And he wastes no time barging in.
The movement startles the patient, who is talk to Emily. Emily has a chair pulled up to the patient’s side, and she gets up, as if ready to protect her. She looks concerned when she sees Jay, but when she sees Sharon and Ethan, she just looks confused.
“Emily Novak,” Jay says, voice nearly dripping with vitriol as he says the stolen last name. “I need you to come with me.”
Emily still looks startled, eyes flitting from Jay to her boss.
Sharon steps up beside him in a show of solidarity. “Emily, this is Detective Halstead,” she explains. “He has a few questions he’d like to ask you.”
Emily moves slowly, glancing back down at the woman. She’s elderly; she looks upset by the intrusion.
“Ma’am, it’s nothing for you to worry about,” she says. “I’ll have another nurse look in on your right away.”
“But Edith is my patient,” Emily starts to protest.
Ethan steps forward as well before Jay can really start to growl. “Emily, please,” he says. “I’ll have Doris check in.”
“Not Doris,” Emily says, shaking her head. She smiles back at the patient. “But maybe Faith? Faith’s very sweet, Edith. You’ll like her.”
Sharon looks from Emily to Ethan, giving him the slightest nod. It obviously took all of Jay’s self control not to drag out of the room with all unnecessary force.
And it took all of Sharon’s not to let him.
-o-
For all that Sharon was the one to hire Emily, she admittedly has spent very little time with her. There had been a few perfunctory meet and greets, but Sharon was a busy woman and Emily had not been the type to seek out her superiors. Sharon had attributed that to shyness before.
Clearly, that had been a mistake.
Now face to face with Emily Novak, she immediately senses what Will Halstead has been trying to tell them all since the beginning. There’s something not right about Emily.
She looks the part well enough. She’s wearing the right clothes, and she has the right demeanor. She’s got training, because she knows her way around an ED, but she doesn’t act like the other nurses. When she looks you in the eyes, it doesn’t feel right.
At all.
Is Sharon projecting?
Possibly.
But this woman has killed at least one person in her hospital, probably more. It’s going to be pretty hard not to project.
Fortunately, getting Emily out of the patient’s room was the extent of her job at the moment. The second Sharon had them secured in a conference room, the show is all Jay’s.
“Is your name Emily Novak?” the detective asks, voice heavy with contempt.
There’s genuine hesitation on Emily’s face, and her gaze skirts imploringly to Sharon. “Yes.”
“Were you involved with the treatment of a Edwin Garside?”
“Ed?” she asks without hesitation. Her face seems to brighten. “Of course I was. Ed was great. He actually got his start as a farmer, but when his farm went bankrupt, he started over from scratch. Taught himself the trade, moved to the city, became an electrician. Worked for ten years in an apprenticeship with kids half his age before finally starting his own business.”
She sounds almost fond, and it’s disconcerting. The detail she remembers.
Most doctors will remember the case statistics.
She’s reciting his life story.
Her sweet smile returns, and it’s more unsettling than before. “I had such a great time with him. He told me all about his kids, his grandkids. He hated how his condition was limiting his ability to spend time with them. He was so worried about becoming a burden.”
The train of logic seems benign on the surface, but Sharon is starting to understand it. Emily -- no matter what her last name is -- is a real nurse. She has real training, and her compassion for patients is based on some semblance of reality.
But she’s an angel of mercy.
She fancies herself as a do-gooder.
By killing her suffering patients, she thinks she’s saving them. That’s how she can stand there and wax poetic about a man she’s killed.
This is numbing to Sharon.
Jay’s mouth twists with barely contained aggression. “You’re wanted on suspicion of murder,” he says. “For your involvement in the death of Edwin Garside.”
She scoffs, as if it is actually a shock. “Murder? But -- how?”
She looks between Jay and Sharon again, even more at a loss.
Sharon feels sick. Jay shakes his head, face twisted even more vehemently than before. “Don’t even,” he says. “Unless you want to tell me how you did it, I don’t want to hear it.”
Her mouth falls open. “But I don’t understand. I care for my patients. Deeply so. Ask anyone. Ask Edith.”
“More like someone should run a tox screen on Edith just to be sure,” Jay snarks. He shakes his head. “I know you’re not really Emily Novak.”
“What?” she says, incredulous now. “Ms. Goodwin, I don’t understand.”
“Just answer the question,” Sharon says, pressing her lips together to keep herself together.
“What question?” she asks, shrugging her shoulders helplessly. “I’m Emily Novak--”
“And Emily Little?” Jay presses. “Emily Lassiter? New York, Florida, Denver--”
The color drains from her face, just so. “This is ridiculous,” she protests. She sounds convincing -- almost.
Almost.
But not quite.
“If there’s something you’d like to confess, now’s the time to do it,” Sharon says. “Because we will be launching a full review of every case you’ve been involved with, starting with Mr. Garside but not ending there.”
At this, she looks bereft. “I care for my patients,” she says, nearly insisting now. She gives a short little laugh. “I care for them more than anyone else in this hospital.”
“Look, you can say whatever you want, but you’re still under arrest,” Jay says. He moves across toward her, handcuffs out. He reaches for her, taking her by the arm and turning her around. “You have the right to remain silent.”
She squawks, the sound a cut-off cry as the cuffs go on, and she’s still shaking her head. “This is crazy! Ms. Goodwin, tell him that this is crazy. Look at my record. My patients notes. Dr. Halstead--”
“Is the one who tipped us off to your involvement,” Sharon says, lest the mention of Jay’s brother’s name sets him off. Jay has her cuffed now, and he turns her back around to face them. “Where is he, anyway? Dr. Choi says you were seen with him.”
Her guise has been good so far, believable. But Sharon sees something shift. A moment of calculator, however small, but Sharon feels its impact with a dreadful inevitability.
She knows something.
She knows everything.
Part of her believes her own story, that much is clear.
But another part of her -- however small -- knows who she is and what she’s doing.
“Dr. Halstead?” she repeats, the veil of sweetness somehow returning. “I saw him leave not twenty minutes ago. He was acting funny, though. Not really himself.”
It’s not the right thing to say, not with Jay Halstead in the room. She’s underestimating that family connection. He shoves her, just barely restraining his rage. “Don’t lie to us,” he snaps. “We know you went off with him.”
Her face contorts. “But why would I lie?” she asks, imploring Sharon once more. “Ms. Goodwin, my record here at Med has been unimpeachable.”
That’s not a tactic that’s going to work, but Sharon needs to play the level-headed one here. “Just answer the question, Emily,” she says shortly. “Where is Dr. Halstead?”
The display of emotion dials back slightly, and Sharon sees a glimpse of a grittier, more unsettling resolve. “I saw him on the stairs, going up. He was by himself,” she says, and she sounds so certain that Sharon suspects it’s some approximation of the truth. She has the audacity to lift her chin with a display of confidence. “I swear. That’s the truth. I saw him upstairs.”
“Fine,” Jay grits out. He grabs her by the arm, dragging her gruffly forward. He looks at Sharon. “Do you have a security team I can borrow?”
She nods, already on her way out the door to grab them.
“I want her watched, and someone call Intelligence for back up. Tell Voight it’s an emergency,” he orders, just a step behind Sharon with Emily in tow. “Because I’m going to find my brother.”
-o-
Security secures Emily, who protests the entire time in the lounge. A crowd is gathering, questions are being asked, and Sharon calls Hank Voight herself to ensure that backup is on the way. Jay Halstead calls Will’s phone, but it rings and rings and rings.
No answer.
“Where would they go?” Jay asks, jaw stiff as he looks at Sharon. “If she took him upstairs, some unused part of the hospital, where would they go?”
Sharon takes a steadying breath. “He might have gone home,” she suggests cautiously. “If he’s driving or if he’s on the train--”
Jay shakes his head, because he knows better, and he’s not willing to stomach the optimistic what-ifs. “Where?” he demands.
“Sixth floor,” she says, and the words taste like ash in her mouth. “It’s the only area of the hospital currently under construction. If she was looking for an unoccupied place in the hospital, that’s the only place she could go.”
That’s all Jay needs to hear, and he’s off. She takes Ethan by the arm, tells him to grab a bag just in case, and Sharon follows just a step behind.
-o-
Ethan likes to think of himself as prepared. Honestly, that’s always been one of those selling features he used to boast about during admission interviews. He’s always prepared.
It’s a facade, though, and he’s propped it up meticulously since he’s been back at work. As if getting shot is just the kind of thing you can roll with.
The joke’s on Ethan, though. He’s not prepared.
Not for how hard each day is.
Not for the demands of the ED.
But Ms. Goodwin tells him to grab his gear, and Jay Halstead looks as serious as Ethan’s ever seen him.
“What is it?” he asks, even as he keeps step. They’re bypassing the elevator, taking the stairs. Up. “Where are we going? Has there been an accident?”
Jay doesn’t answer, but he increases his pace so he’s moving two at a time. Ms. Goodwin is going as fast as she can, and she looks at Ethan grimly. “I hope not,” she says. “But at this point, we need to be prepared for the possibility.”
The possibility.
But of what?
Ethan shakes his head. “What happened, though?”
Ahead of them, Jay is nearly a floor above them, turning out of sight up another staircase. “It’s a long story,” Ms. Goodwin provides, starting to breathe heavily as she tries to keep up.
“One that ends with Emily being arrested?” Ethan asks, because trying to be scant on the details doesn’t work when there’s that fact staring them both in the face.
Ms. Goodwin snorts. “We can hope that’s the end of it, but right now, I’m not actually convinced.”
She’s being vague, and in a rather dire kind of way. It’s not like her, to be honest. She’s a realist, and she’s a strong believer in their ability to address any problem adequately.
Right now, however, she is bordering on fatalistic.
Ethan’s heart rate is quickening, and it’s not just because of the physical exertion of climbing the stairs. “Arrest, though?” he asks. “For what?”
She looks at him, even more sober than before. “Murder.”
She says it just like that, matter of fact, putting it out there. Ethan doesn’t dare slow his pace, but his stomach drops down and he feels suddenly quite nauseated. “Murder? You mean the Garside case?”
It’s the only open investigation he knows about right now, though he hadn’t thought it had officially been declared anything. In the ED, it’s not uncommon to work with the police on murder cases -- wrongful death, manslaughter, assault and the like. But Ms. Goodwin isn’t talking about the latest gang shootout. She’s not talking about an unfortunate domestic dispute or workplace roiling.
Truthfully, Ethan doesn’t know what she’s talking about.
His confusion is heightened as she turns the corner to make her way up another flight of stairs toward their destination to the construction zone. “And more.”
His feet stop, just for a moment, and he has to double his pace to catch back up with her. “More? Ms. Goodwin, I don’t understand what you mean. What is going on here?”
This time, she pulls to a stop. Jay is far ahead of them by now, but they still hear the sound of his feet on the cement. But Ms. Goodwin draws a breath and meets his gaze fully. “I’m going to be honest with you. I’m not sure I understand this situation fully myself, but I know it’s a lot more serious than any of us have allowed ourselves to possibly believe. We need to find Dr. Halstaed. Now.”
She’s making it sound even more dire now, but Ethan feels like he’s still not putting the pieces together. “Will? But why? What does he have to do with any of this.”
She inhales deeply and shakes her head. “Because it’s Emily. He’s been telling us for months that there’s something going on with her, and we all dismissed him. And now? Now, he’s missing, and she’s the last one who saw him.”
Ethan grapples with the implication, because he knows what it seems like she’s saying, but he can’t possibly make that parse. That Emily is wanted for murder. That Will--
That Will--
Ethan shakes head head, brow set more deeply than before. “I thought you sent him home.”
Ms. Goodwin nods. “Let’s just hope he made it there.”
Then, a few floors up, they hear a yell. It’s inaudible at first, somewhere between a cry and an exclamation. Then, Jay’s voice echoes down. “I found him! I found him!”
This time, Ethan leads the way, because somehow he knows, as fast as he can go is not going to be fast enough.
-o-
At the right floor, Ethan flings the door open. Ms. Goodwin has fallen somewhat behind, and he doesn’t bother to wait for her or hold the door. He charges inside, trying to get his bearings as quickly as he can. He’s been on this floor before, of course, but it’d been closed down six months ago for impending renovations. The process had stalled out -- something from the construction crew about delays due to COVID -- and it hadn’t been occupied all this time. It’s technically a construction zone, but it’s mostly abandoned. The work hasn’t really been started yet, but it’s dim and dingy with disuse.
Inside, it’s not hard to find Jay. He’s no more than fifteen feet from the exit near the old nurse’s station. It’s one of the older departments left in the hospital -- which is why it’d been flagged for renovation -- and the plan had been to create a more welcoming, open layout.
Even so, Ethan has a clear view forward.
He sees Jay on his hands and knees.
He’s lying next to something.
Someone.
The body laid out prone on the ground takes a minute to register. It’s until he’s right behind Jay that he recognizes the tall figure and the shock of red hair.
It’s Will.
Jay is leaned over his brother, fingers pressed to his neck. He shakes his head, leaning down to put his ear next to Will’s mouth. “I have a pulse,” he says. “But I can’t tell if he’s breathing.”
He sits up, looking at Ethan with a frantic desperation he’s never seen in the cop before.
“Why the hell isn’t he breathing?” Jay demands.
It’s a good question, and it’s not one Ethan can answer. He stands, for a moment still shellshocked at the scene in front of him, but then he remembers he’s the one with a medical license and a doctor’s kit in his hand.
“Okay,” he says, galvanized into action. Context doesn’t matter in an emergency -- not really. That’s why Dean saving his life is still important to him. You save the life. As a doctor, you always, always save the life. “Let me see.”
He steps around Will, going to his knees on the doctor’s other side. Jay is watching him, and Ethan does his best not to notice. He reaches down, checking the pulse. It’s there, just like Jay says. But it’s fast, thready. It’s irregular.
He tries not to frown as he bends over. He needs to get a portable monitor set up, but it’s clear that Will’s not moving enough air to make a difference. He’s going to need artificial breathing support at least until they get him stabilized.
Sitting up, he gives Jay a passing glance. “I’m going to help Will, Jay -- I am, but I could use a hand,” he says. “Can you do rescue breathing? Just until we get the gear out.”
Jay’s not a doctor, but he’s not a novice. As a cop, he’d have some first aid training, and he knows Jay to be competent. He’s hoping that he can hold it together -- especially with his brother’s life on the line.
Jay’s gone colorless but he nods.
“Just steady, even breaths,” Ethan coaches, getting his bag open. Jay leans down. “Pinch the nose, tilt the chin -- that’s it.”
He watches as Jay opens the airway, easily blowing in a breath of air. Ethan watches for a moment, and Will’s chest rises and falls. Airway obstruction is out, then. That’s one less thing to worry about, but given the host of other problems, Ethan’s pretty sure he shouldn’t start celebrating yet.
He gets out the trauma scissors first, neatly slicing up the front of Will’s scrubs. Jay watches while he breathes for his brother, Will’s exposed chest still rising and falling at Jay’s command. Next, Ethan unloads the monitor, hastily readying the electrodes. As he starts positioning them on Will’s chest, Ms. Goodwin catches up with him. She makes a small, strangled noise before going to her knees at Will’s head, looking at Ethan stoically. “What can I do?”
“We need to get a better read on his vitals,” Ethan says, hooking up the next electrode. He reaches over to turn on the device and rummages for the pulse-ox monitor. “But he’s not moving air. If you can bag him--”
He doesn’t have to ask. Ms. Goodwin is already securing the bag, setting it up correctly and placing the mouth piece to Will’s lips. She starts squeezes, steady, even compressions.
This gives Ethan the freedom to conduct a more thorough assessment and start getting his bearings on the situation at hand. With the electrodes in place, the monitor goes live, and Ethan starts getting his first look at Will’s vitals.
It’s not what he expects.
But then again, none of this is anything that he’s expected.
Ms. Goodwin’s face is set hard and long. Jay has gone white, and his eyes are wide and terrified.
Ethan double checks the vitals -- pulse, heart rate, oxygen levels, blood pressure.
And grimaces.
He recognizes the readings, but in the context, they don’t make sense. None of this makes sense, and Ethan is torn between being the doctor he’s trained to be and the friend he feels like. He shakes his head, because the line of vitals don’t change. He can’t will his way out of this one.
“I think he’s having a heart attack,” he says finally, giving in to the truth.
Somehow, on her knees on the other side of Will, squeezing the bag, Ms. Goodwin doesn’t look surprised. Her expression is terse, and her fingers don’t miss a pulse with the bag. “We need a full cardiac workup, and we need to run the extended tox screen -- checking for everything we can think of,” she says readily. “We better have cardiology meet us down there.”
“Whoa, wait, Jay says. He’s on his feet now, pacing back and forth in front of them when he comes to a stop. “He’s having a heart attack? But how?”
Ethan’s stomach flips, and he doesn’t have an answer as he sets up for an IV. He’d brought a larger medical kit, and he’s glad. Will needs the line ASAP.
Ethan’s the doctor here, but Ms. Goodwin’s on point. She’s still bagging, sure and steady, and her eyes lift toward Jay. “That’s a question to answer later,” she says. “Right now, I need you on your phone and calling down to the ED. Tell them we have a code on the sixth floor, and I want a gurney, crash cart and full medical team. Now.”
If Jay has any hesitations, they dissipate instantly. Because the portable monitor shows something else, something that none of them need Ethan to diagnose. “He’s crashing,” he announces anyway, lining himself to get in position as Will’s heart gives out. He’s doing compressions before anyone has a chance to react, pressing down hard and fast on Will’s breastbone, watching as his body jerks under the ministrations.
It’s a sobering reality, and it’s an incontrovertible one. Jay responds by making the call, face almost translucent now as he dials. Sharon reaches for the bag. “Do you have epi?” she asks quietly. She’s trying not to make a scene -- or a bigger scene -- but they both know how serious this is.
“I should,” he says, not yielding in his compressions. He has to compress the heart; he has to keep the blood pumping. If blood doesn’t get to Will’s brain, to his other internal organs, then he’s never getting off the sixth floor. “We need to run it, 5 ccs.”
It’s a rote order, and Ms. Goodwin has been a practicing nurse for years, but she still remembers. Putting the bag down for a moment, she reaches for the medical pack, rifling through its content until she pulls out the right vial and a fresh syringe. She doesn’t say anything else as she pushes it into the IV line, running it straight into Will’s bloodstream.
Ethan is still pressing on Will’s chest as she picks up the bag and starts squeezing it again. “He could use a tube,” she mutters, almost to herself.
Ethan responds anyway -- because he’s having the same thought. “No time. The priority is the heart. Then, we secure the airway.”
He pauses, looking at the monitor. “Okay, v-fib,” he says. “We can shock him.”
If there were a full medical team on hand, this would go faster, but Ethan will work with what he has. He picks up the defibrillator, easily placing it on Will’s chest. He glances up, making eye contact with his boss. “Clear.”
She says nothing but puts the bag down, holding up her hands to show that she’s not making contact with Will.
Jay looks like he’s about to be sick behind them.
Ethan can’t worry about that, though. The device is set to 200, and Ethan presses it down, letting the charge go. Will convulses just slightly, his body jerking and going still. Ms. Goodwin is already reaching for the bag while Ethan watches the readout.
With relief. “Okay, his pulse is back,” he says.
Relief, though, is short lived. And in context, Ethan knows it’s not entirely warranted. Will’s got a pulse, but he’s still not moving air -- and he’s still having a heart attack.
“I don’t like his oxygen levels,” Ms. Goodwin says, even as she presses the bag again. “Have you checked his reflexes?”
Ethan does so, going through the quick checklist and finding Will only marginally responsive. “He’s not doing a good job at protecting his airway,” he says. “I brought the intubation kit.”
It’s a lucky foresight. Planning for anything means planning for the unlikely. You don’t take a bullet and not learn that lesson. You don’t fire your mentor and not take that lesson utterly to heart.
He grapples through the kit, trying to harness the adrenaline surging through him even while it threatens to overwhelm him. His fingers are just shy of shaking, but he grabs the kit and pulls it out. He’s overcome all the odds for himself to get here. He’ll overcome a few more for Will’s sake.
He spares a glance at his coworker -- his friend. His right-hand man, really. Life in the ED wouldn’t be possible without Will, and Ethan’s not naive. He knows he’s only making it by as chief because Will’s played second fiddle so impeccably since his fall from grace. It’s painful for both of them how they got here, but they’ve been better off for it.
Ethan gets the tube out, moving around to be behind Will’s head and get better visualization of the airway.
He really hopes they’re still better for it when this is all said and done.
Mindful of Will’s teeth, he has to adjust the airway one more time. Once he sees the cords, he guides the tube in, letting it slide over Will’s tongue seamlessly, and threading it past the throat’s anatomy until he feels the proper placement. As Ms. Goodwin reattaches the bag to the end of the tube, he takes out the stethoscope, listening to Will’s chest as the oxygen is moved once more. With the sound of the lungs, he can tell the tube is placed correctly. The oxygen levels start to rise once more.
Then, from behind them, there’s fresh clatter. Ethan is startled for a moment, but Jay is jogging back toward them with a small sound of relief. Ethan hears the familiar sound of a gurney being pushed across linoleum, and he looks up in time to see a full medical team responding.
The response time is fast.
He looks back down at Will, whose waxy complexion and still features make a strong case that it might not have been fast enough.
-o-
It’s been years since Sharon was a practicing nurse, but there are some skills you don’t forget. Some are just too palpable, too tied to emotion. That overwhelming sensation when you hold a life in your hands -- the surge of adrenaline will always bring her back.
And no matter what they tell you in training, medicine is always personal. You always feel connections to patients, and you always feel the weight of their injuries as your own. It’s impossible to do this job and not feel it, though you can learn to manage it.
Sharon’s out of practice, unfortunately.
And this time, it’s one of her own.
Her hands had squeezed oxygen into the lungs of one of her doctors. She’d saved the live of one of her employees. Will Halstead, for better or for worse, is her responsibility, and she stands there, watching as he’s loaded up on a gurney and redlined down to the ED.
He’s alive, but that doesn’t feel like much comfort. Life and death is always a precarious thing in the ED, and these days, it’s even worse. The pandemic has been its own killer, directly and indirectly, and now a serial killer? On top of everything else?
There are just no breaks to be had, it seems. Not for her.
Not for Dr. Halstead, it seems.
She watches as he is loaded up, her care being replaced by an entire team. They all looked confused and shellshocked, but they’re professionals. They’ll have questions later, to be sure, but they’ll keep to the task at hand first.
The questions, though, are Sharon’s most pressing concern. Glancing over, she sees Jay Halstead still planted at her side. He seems frozen and transfixed, and she’s sure that he’s in as much shock as his brother at the moment. Only his can’t be treated with fluids and medications.
Jay doesn’t look at her, not even as the elevator doors slide shut and his brother is whisked from view. “Is he going to die?” he asks, voice thin. “Did she kill him?”
Sharon is not one for platitudes, and she knows he’s not the kind of man who wants them, even if part of him craves them. “I don’t know,” she admits. “He’s in very serious condition.”
He closes his eyes, as if that notion is ludicrous enough to amuse him. He shakes his head again, and he looks at her. “Can they save him?”
The pressure under his gaze is intense, but she lacks the luxury of looking away. “Again, I don’t know. It will depend on what she did to him.”
“And what did she do to him?” he asks, voice hinging with emotion now, ratcheting upward.
“I don’t know,” she says simply. “I didn’t know until an hour ago that she was even a threat. None of the deaths have been flagged by any of our normal processes or pathology tests. Whatever she’s doing -- whatever concoctions she’s employing -- she’s picking them carefully to fly under the radar. I’m sure that’s how she manages to stay under the radar.”
She’s using reason and logic, which would normally appeal to a detective like Jay. Today, however, he seems to have no patience for it. “And what if we don’t know what she did?”
Sharon sighs, because it’s something she’s tried not to think about -- tried, and failed. “It’ll make it harder to treat him,” she says. “Medications can have different impacts, and they have to be counteracted carefully. We can’t target the problem with the right solution unless we know what we’re looking at it. We’ll run the most complex tox screen we have, but some medications are simply harder to track.”
She’s telling him the reasons.
All the reasons why his brother might still die.
Jay knows this.
He knows this.
He breaths, standing rigidly next to her. He tightens and loosens his jaw, and she watches as he seems to come to some kind of resolution. “There’s one person who will know.”
Sharon’s eyebrows go up at the implication. “Can we question her if she’s not in custody?”
Jay’s look is withering. “If it saves Will’s life--”
Sharon nods; she understands. “--then it’s worth it.”