Chapter Text
Dennis came to Pittsburgh wanting to become the best person he could possibly be, the doctor he always wanted to become, leaving behind everything he has known in his life. The farm, his parents, his brothers and the god that he has been desperately praying to on his broken, scrapped knees.
Angry shouts, disappointing looks and a disapproving shake of a head were the last thing he saw before adjusting the strap of his backpack, closing the door behind himself with no remorse.
That was years ago, he never looked back, starting his new life as a med student in the new city. His rotations started months ago going through internal medicine, peds and now - Emergency medicine.
He started his PTMC rotation a week ago and safe to say, he can’t see himself continuing anywhere else - the rush, the action and the people. His whole life, Dennis has been craving this type of commitment to one place.
The ache in his bones after every shift reminds him he has been spending the day saving people, learning something new with every case and every patient - being useful.
Not to mistake his hardship with ease - he can’t remember the last night he slept more than three hours, no day where he has not been feeling a deep, excruciating pain from his stomach and intestines cramping simply from being malnourished and no shift where his head isn’t splitting in half from pain of dehydration.
He wouldn’t change it for the world - this is where he needs to be.
Things have been worse, he tells himself.
Sleeping in his cramped room back in Broken Boy with three of his elder brothers, knowing every sound he made would be a reason for a beating. Days where wrestling turned into simply holding him down, beating him and counting down minutes until he passed out.
Med school was worse in the beginning years, sleeping anywhere he could on campus, empty lecture halls, empty hallways or on a bench in the park.
Now though, now things are better, he reminds himself everyday. He sleeps on a bed every night he can, seeking shelter in the empty room on the 8th floor of the hospital. It’s far from comfortable, far from being able to call it home - but you can’t miss something you never tasted.
So every sandwich he steals from the patient cart, he eats with crippling guilt settling itself next to it in his stomach, knowing he took it from some patient who might’ve needed it more. Every minute of sleep he gets in the dark, cold hospital room on an uncomfortable gurney, he takes with a chill in his bone and a racing heart thinking someone might storm into the room any second.
Dennis has never known comfort in his life, the word itself has lost its meaning to him, becoming hollow and empty. Getting by, surviving - those are the important things in his life.
He does have things he looks forward to, he isn’t hopeless or suicidal or something - he loves his life, he just acknowledged that he isn’t as privileged as other people; and that’s okay.
He loves working at the Pitt for example, and can even say he has made some friends there. He has great bosses and even better mentors who he has learned from every day. He even started paying back student loans - so he takes those things, holds them close to his heart and doesn’t let anything bring him down.
And then there’s Dr. Robby. His immediate boss, the middle aged, very competent but sad looking man he has had the pleasure of working under - that was his first impression of the man.
On his first day, Dennis tried, oh he tried so hard, to make the man like him. There was a deep ache in his rib cage yelling at him to make a good impression on the man.
Let’s see, he crushed his fingers during a patient transfer, changed his scrubs more times than he can count due to numerous bodily fluids splashing on him, his phone rang during a silent moment after a patient passed, funk pop echoing in the room making heads turn looking at him as if he purposefully just spat on the dead man’s dignity.
Safe to say - no, Robby probably thought what the fuck kind of people do they let into med school these days.
But, Whitaker likes to believe he redeemed himself after that awful day. He even solved a nasty rat problem they had! Snapping the hairy little things neck after catching it - he still remembers Robby’s look; raised brows, brown, curious eyes looking his way and a small crinkle around his eyes forming when he started smiling. He was so enamoured by the man, he forgot the little rodent spilling red blood all over his gloves.
Whitaker’s heart started speeding up watching the man look at him with a look he couldn't read but Dennis’s brain just sang with some kind of pride, knowing he had the man’s attention even if just for a split second.
Dennis knows what he feels is most likely just an extension of his daddy issues and loneliness. He can’t possibly think of his boss, twice his age by the way, as anything other than that - his fucking boss.
But Whitaker has been strung along the man’s charm, he knows it.
“Huckleberry!”
Startled, Dennis looks up at the brown haired woman leaning against their work station. He was just taking a quick break from charting, watching said man across the ED talking to, what seems to be two police officers, his arms crossed over his chest and a hand stroking his beard while in thought - he does that a lot-
“You back with us from dreamland, princess?” she says mockingly, batting her eyelashes at him. Dennis is used to ignoring her crude comments so he rolls his eyes and goes back to charting. She still hovers though so he tries his hardest to focus on his typing - 34 y/o M presents with substernal CP starting ca 2 hrs PTA while resting. Describes pressure-like pain -
“Stop ignoring me, shithead I saw you staring just now-” Dennis halts his typing and looks around to check if anyone heard Trinity’s comment. Dennis looks at his watch - 2 hours left.
“What are you talking about, do you not have any patients waiting for you?” The woman shrugs her shoulders and leans forward to get closer to Dennis. “You don’t have to hide your crush from me, little man.” she says and taps her own temple with a knowing look before turning around, seemingly finally going back to her job.
It’s not Whitaker’s fault, really, he doesn’t spend his day sitting and ogling his boss, he really doesn’t, ever since people started noticing Robby’s touches he even tries to get out of the man’s way as much as possible.
By “Robby’s touches”, he means the numerous times, Dennis would feel himself getting pushed around the ED by a hand on his shoulder, a grip on his neck or even a hand on his lower back, guiding the younger man right where he wants him.
It really didn’t bother him at first, he even liked (see: Daddy Issues previously mentioned) yet, when you’re a medical student, with multiple other students fighting for the admiration of one man, the man who is going to write one letter, determining their future, you really shouldn’t allow favoritism to take place. So when Dennis noticed that kind of attention on him and really only on him, he started feeling really guilty. Does he deserve this? Robby never even just brushes a hand over Javadi’s shoulder, never ruffles her hair when she’s charting and he’s passing by.
Dennis takes a second and thinks about match-day in the future - already feeling a mix of anxiety and dread make its way to the surface of the thought of not matching right here at PTMC, what if they send him somewhere else.
“Day-shift people, gather around!” Robby’s yell startles Dennis, making him gather his things quickly before getting up and turning the corner to his coworkers standing huddled in the center of the ED, Robby at the front with the two police officers next to him. Do they look worried? Their brows furrowed, hands strapped to their belt, Dennis wonders if that’s just muscle memory of if they need quick access to -
“Alright, everyone, I have just been talking to the officers who interviewed our stab-wound patient - she was in an altercation with an intoxicated 30-40 year old white male, this tall with a clear tattoo going from the top of his neck to the side of his arm. I am telling you this because he is still on the lookout, witnesses at the scene reported hearing him threatening the woman repeatedly and the police believe he may want to come here to find her.” Robby rattles on with a clear stern voice, his announcement echoing around the room, giving time for everyone at the Pitt to take in the information.
Murmurs of his coworkers start after a second and Dennis feels his blood rush in his ears, holding his thumb to his mouth to gnaw on the raw cuticles on his nail. He knew the dangers of working in an ED, feeling that very danger on his first days with the shooting, Dana and Mr. Driscoll, the virus that shut them down days ago…
Robby points to the emergency exits and the officers next to him with a nod, “Security measures have been placed, there are officers at every exit, especially in chairs and pictures of the man have been going around so don’t let this distract you, focus on your patients as best as you can.” Robby says with a final nod and dismisses the rest of his colleagues to talk to Ahmad and the officers at the exits.
Dennis is still deep in thought when Trinity rushes to his side, “what the fuck man? Didn’t you work on that patient?” she says with a worried look
“Yeah, I did, with Robby actually, she was…” he says and looks at Trinity with sad eyes. The woman nods slowly and purses her lips, he exhales a sigh and goes to check on his patient.
-two hours ago-
“Incoming trauma, woman, 24 years old with a stab wound!” Whitaker hears Dana yell from her station, phone still in her hand. Footsteps rush through the corridor and the rattle of the rolling gurney grows louder with every second.
“Whitaker, McKay, with me!” Robby growls as he turns and heads straight for the doors to the ambulance bay. Dana looks at her station “Perlah!”
The trauma doors slam open as the paramedics wheel the stretcher inside.
“Twenty-four-year-old female,” the lead medic starts, already moving alongside the bed. “Single stab wound to the left flank. Found in an alley about ten minutes ago. Possible sexual assault. GCS thirteen on scene, now fourteen. Vitals en route: BP ninety-eight over sixty, heart rate one-twenty, respirations twenty-four, sat ninety-four on fifteen liters non-rebreather.”
Dennis sees the woman on the stretcher is pale, her clothes cut open down the front, trauma shears tossed aside. A dark, spreading stain covers the left side of her abdomen, just above the hip.
“Alright, let’s move,” Robby says with Dennis on the opposite side of the gurney next to McKay “1,2,3” they transfer her onto the trauma bed in one practiced motion.
“Airway?”
“Patent,” Whitaker replies quickly, leaning close to the patient’s face. “She’s breathing, trying to talk.”
“Breathing?”
McKay slides the stethoscope under the oxygen mask. “Breath sounds present bilaterally. Slightly shallow.”
“Circulation,” Robby says, already pressing gloved gauze against the wound. Blood wells up between his fingers.
“Pressure dressing,” he adds. “Let’s get two large-bore IVs in.”
Whitaker ties a tourniquet around the patient’s arm, sliding an eighteen-gauge catheter into the vein. “IV in.”
“Second line coming,” McKay says from the other side. “Start fluids. Type and cross for blood,” Robby orders. “And get trauma labs.”
The patient groans softly, eyelids fluttering. Dennis is by her side in a second, leaning over her “Hey,” Whitaker says gently. “Can you hear me? What’s your name?”
Her lips move under the mask. The word is barely audible.
“Ava,” Whitaker repeats, loud enough for the room. “Okay, Ava, you’re in the hospital. You’re safe.”
“BP dropping,” Perlah calls from the monitor. “Ninety over fifty-eight.”
“Let’s move faster,” Robby says. He lifts the dressing just enough to assess the injury. “Single penetrating wound on the left flank. No obvious exit.”
He presses the gauze back down.
“FAST exam,” he says.
McKay grabs the ultrasound probe, sliding gel across the patient’s abdomen while the room falls briefly quiet except for the monitor’s rapid beeping.
“Looking for free fluid,” she mutters. The screen flickers with grey shadows.
“Possible fluid in Morrison’s pouch,” she says after a moment.
Robby exhales sharply. “Could be intra-abdominal bleeding.”
The patient suddenly jerks slightly, coughing under the mask.
“Hey, easy,” Whitaker says. “Stay with us.”
Her eyes open halfway, glassy and confused. She tries to move her arm.
“Don’t move,” Whitaker tells her. “You’ve been stabbed. We’re taking care of you.”
The words barely seem to register. Her gaze drifts across the bright trauma bay lights.
“Heart rate one-thirty,” Perlah says.
“Alright,” Robby says, a decision already made. “Call surgery. Tell them we’re heading to the OR.”
He glances down at the patient again.
“You’re doing good,” he says firmly. “Stay with us.”
“He… he wouldn’t stop.”
The room goes quieter, the team still moving but more deliberately now.
McKay pulls the sheet slightly higher over the patient’s lower body, instinctively giving her a bit more privacy even in the chaos.
Robby nods once.
“Okay,” he says, voice steady. “Let’s focus on stabilizing her first.”
Whitaker nods, looking at his patient “Ava,” he says gently. “You’re safe here.”
Her eyes squeeze shut, a tear slipping down the side of her face.
Perlah glances toward Robby, whose eyebrows are scrunched in irritation, softly Whitaker asks him “You want me to notify SANE?”
Robby nods again without hesitation. “Yeah. Call Dana, she’s our sexual assault nurse examiner, she’ll call Kiara and the police.”
He presses fresh gauze over the wound. Whitaker adjusts the IV line while watching the patient’s face. “You’re doing good,” he tells her quietly, “just keep breathing.”
Across the room McKay finishes the ultrasound sweep.
“Free fluid confirmed,” she says. Robby exhales. “Alright,” he says. “We’re going to surgery.”
He looks down at the patient again.
“Let’s move.”
—-----------
Dennis had never seen a sexual assault patient, or really never worked on one first hand. The woman had looked so scared and so small on the bed, he couldn't help but think about how everything happened, how people could be so evil and do something like this, the thought plaguing him since his first day, the Pitt shooting. .