Eccedentesiast

"This is a joke, right?" I grumbled, sliding down into my chair. There were too many of us sitting in this hallway. We were all in trouble, but no one knew why.

"Someone's getting fired." Reed was probably the most annoying person in the hospital. She was rude, and she thought she knew everything. And I was just waiting for the day that someone finally decked her in the face.

"Stop it." Kepner tried to be the peacemaker, but she was almost as annoying as Reed with her constant positivity and high pitched voice.

"She wasn't even my patient." Percy was a dickhead. In fact, every doctor that came from Mercy West was a dickhead.

"What?" Everyone was pissed. We were all tired, and being cramped in a hallway together wasn't helping anyone's attitudes. I wasn't even sure why I was down here. Whatever happened didn't happen on my watch.

"Nothing." I rolled my eyes, sinking further into my chair. All I wanted was to go home or to go to an on call room and sleep, but I wasn't off for another six hours.

"How long is this gonna take?"

"Why? You need to make a phone call?" My head snapped in Jackson's direction, and I smacked his arm. I didn't agree with Karev's methods, but his cancer stricken wife had left him with no indication to where she was going or if she planned on coming back. He had every right to try to get a hold of her. I opened my mouth to say as much, but Karev beat me to it. It all happened so fast that I nearly caught an elbow to the face again as Karev grabbed Jackson by the front of his scrubs and slammed him into the wall.

"Cut it out!" I yelled, trying to get between the two of them. Hunt and Shepherd were the first ones over, pulling them away from each other. Everything fell apart after that. Everyone started yelling, and I had half a mind to leave. The woman that died wasn't my patient to begin with.

"I said enough!" Chief Webber walked out of the office we were all going to end up in at some point, and he was pissed, "What happened here tonight, what happened to that patient, was inexcusable. And we're going to be here until I find out who's responsible for it. So until then, you will sit down, you will shut up, and you will wait to be called. Hunt." I sat back down, crossing my arms over my chest. They were all a bunch of children in grown man's bodies.

"You need your ass kicked," I said to Jackson once he sat down. He stared at me in disbelief. I just rolled my eyes.

"You can't be serious, Ariana."

"His wife left him, Jackson. She's sick and she left him and he has no idea where she is or if she's okay. So have at least a little sympathy, and think about how you would feel if the roles were reversed. Not everything is a competition. Stop being such a dick."

"Sorry," he muttered like a scolded child.

"Don't apologize to me. Apologize to Karev." I stood, walking to the other side of the room. I began to pace, waiting to get my interrogation over with. One by one, each resident and attending went in, but no one came out looking relaxed. Our jobs were in jeopardy.

"Harper." The chief's eyes were on me, and I took a deep breath before I followed him into the conference room. There were two other people sitting down at the table, and I felt like I was in court.

"Dr. Harper, this Larry Jennings from our board," I gave him a short nod and looked to the woman that was sitting on the other side of Chief Webber, "This is our in house counsel." I nodded to her as well and tried my best to relax. I hadn't done anything wrong.

"I'm not sure why I'm here," I stated, pushing my fingers through my hair.

"I need you to tell me your view on what happened in the ER tonight."

"I don't know. I was only in the ER for two minutes. I heard that were getting a flood of patients from a hotel fire. I saw a guy come in with an axe in his chest, and then I was paged." I sat back in my chair, praying that this would be over with soon. There wasn't too much information that I could give them because I hadn't seen anything other than Percy faint and pull the axe from the guy's chest.

"Who paged you?"

"One of the nurses on my glioblastoma case."

"You're on Dr. Shepherd's service?" He seemed surprised, and I was almost offended.

"I'm the one that found the tumor for him. The patient had been to four other neuro-specialists, and they all told him that it was inoperable, so I asked Dr. Shepherd to take a look. They paged me because the patient was complaining of chest pains."


"What the hell happened?" I asked as a man with an axe in his chest was wheeled past me. The ER was in absolute chaos, and there were burn victims in every direction.

"Hotel fire. Beds four and five have minor injuries. Check them out." Hunt was barking orders as usual. It was something that he was good at, but this was his ER. I turned to walk over to the woman with what looked like a first degree burn on her arm, but my pager went off. Something was wrong with Elijah.

"Here. I've gotta check on one of my patients." I handed my clipboard to Jackson and power walked toward the elevator, pressing the button three times. When I'd made it up to Elijah's room, there was already a nurse inside. I opened my mouth to ask why I had been paged, but she beat me to it.

"He's complaining of chest pains. His breathing sounds normal, but I wanted to be sure." I nodded once, walking over to the side of the bed.

"Eli, I need you to sit up for me. Can you do that?" He sat up slowly, wincing as he adjusted himself. I put the resonator on his back, listening for anything abnormal, "Take a deep breath for me." I moved around, trying to find the source of the problem, but he sounded fine to me. I looked to the nurse, "Could you give us a minute?" She handed me his chart and walked out, leaving us alone.

"I'm sorry. I heard there was a lot going on in the ER," he said as he laid back, wincing on the way down.

"What's going on with you? Your breath sounds are normal. I'm probably gonna have to send you up for a chest CT just to make sure nothing is wrong." I put my stethoscope around my neck and took a seat on the corner of the bed.

"Surgery tomorrow." I should have known. Elijah was always a worry wart, though this situation called for it. Dr. Shepherd was getting ready to cut into his brain, and it was possible that he wouldn't wake up.

"Don't be so worried. I'll be in the OR the entire time, and Dr. Shepherd is honestly the best neurosurgeon in the country. You're in good hands. He wouldn't do the surgery if he wasn't positive that he could get the tumor out." That was one thing people forgot about Dr. Shepherd a lot of the time. If thought surgery was going to do more harm than good, he wouldn't do it. He felt good about Elijah's surgery.

"Then why did everyone else tell me that it was inoperable?"

"Like I said, he's the best in the country. You're going to make it out of this, I promise." We weren't supposed to promise life to anyone. It was one of the first things they teach you, but I wasn't sure what else I was supposed to say to make him feel better.

"Thank you for doing this, Ariana. You didn't have to."

"I know that, and as much as I hate your guts, I don't want you to die." I gave him a small smile, placing my hand over his.

"So, if I make it out of this, can I take you to dinner? As a thank you?" I stiffened, knowing it wasn't a good idea. I wan't going to fall back into something I knew was going to end up the same.

"I don't think that's a good idea, Eli."

"Why not?"

"Because nothing's changed. I work 80 hour weeks, and that's not counting the time that I'm on call." I really hoped this wasn't going to turn into an argument. I didn't have the patience, and the ER was full of people that needed to be treated. I couldn't sit here and go back and forth with him.

"Just think about it." I sighed, putting my hair up into a ponytail.

"Alright. I'm gonna order a chest CT just to be sure, but I have to get back downstairs. I'll see you later." I pat his leg and stood, walking out to the nurses station.

"Take him up to CT for me. Page me when you have the results." The nurse nodded, and I walked back to the elevator, mentally preparing myself for whatever was waiting in the pit.

"When I got back to the ER, the woman was already dead." Me being in the conference room was a waste of time. I didn't even see the woman until she was already gone with every resident on call standing around her and the attending asking whose patient she was.

"You can go, Harper." I let out a small breath and walked from the room.

"Adamson." She was the last to go in, and everyone looked stressed. I knew my job was safe, and for arguments sake, I hoped everyone else's was too.

"What do you think's going to happen?" Jackson asked once I sat down again.

"Someone's getting fired." I just didn't know who. Twenty minutes later, Reed walked out of the conference room, a weird look on her face. She was talking to Kepner, and that's when I knew. Kepner was getting fired.