ER just got renewed through a twelfth season. All I can think of -- well, besides, "I hope Wing Chun and Sars have fired me by then" -- is, "Oh my GOD, that's a lot of ocular tomfoolery."
As recently as last week on ER, Romano cooked his arm, then decided that Charred Rocket with a side of Sensory-Damage Chutney didn't look so appealing swinging from his shoulder. He wants to lop it off. An ex-gang member's family got shot; the sister was paralyzed and the brother, Turner, was shot in the abdomen. Curtis rejoined the gang to get revenge, and a shootout ensued. Pratt got matched with Northwestern, to his delight, and will be leaving County. Luka went to the Congo, and Carter previously turned down the same placement with Alliance de Medicine Internacionale.
In a dark room, Carter is asleep, until the loyal family maid wakes him. She doesn't seem to mind that she's dressed in an old-school uniform, a marker of indentured servitude that should've been obsolete several decades ago. Gamma's dead, honey. Wear some khakis. Carter resists waking up, but eventually he bolts upright. The maid offers him breakfast; as he wipes his tired eyes, he mutters that he doesn't need anything. The maid leaves, and Carter promptly pulls a Heathen -- which, personally, I'd rather have refer to something naughty done to Luka's hot sweaty frame, but he hasn't called me yet -- and flops back down onto his bed for some extra sleep. "Dr. Carter," the maid warns, poking her head back through the door. "I'm up," Carter insists, sitting up hastily. Groaning, he shuffles to the window and throws open the curtains to expose Gamma's perfectly manicured, palatial gardens.
Carter yawns his way into County General at 8:02 AM for the day shift, according to the Graphic of Complicated Story Concepts. "You're late," Pratt chides him, dumping off a bunch of charts. There's a couple gangbangers there, and the turf wars have every department full up and backed up. Susan pulls up and parks behind the front desk long enough to share the delightful detail that a bunch of food-poisoned Texans are puking up hash browns, but are desperate to leave by 2:16 PM so they can see the solar eclipse. Susan, ever the cynic, can't figure out why people take pleasure in watching things that involve the cosmos, or nature, or anything you can't find on TV or at the bottom of a wine bottle. "The moon blocks out the sun -- big deal. I've got a billboard outside my apartment that does the same thing," she snorts. Pratt grins and bids them farewell for the night. "I thought this was it," Susan says, surprised. "Almost. I've got one more night slumming it with you cats, then I'm headed uptown," Pratt grins, swinging through the lounge door...
...and then bursting right out of it again, shrugging on his lab coat. "You're late," Jerry says. It's 8:11 PM that same day, and Pratt's beginning the night shift, according to the Graphic of Do You See What We're Doing Here -- I Mean, Do You Really? Jerry scolds him for being late to take over from Carter. "What's he gonna do? Fire me?" Pratt laughs. Jerry asks if Pratt saw the eclipse and geeks out about how infrequently they take place. Pratt couldn't care less, and in fact slept through most of it. That's how almost all of my friends feel about this show now. As Jerry babbles, Pratt stares down the hall at Carter, who is wearing blue scrubs and is speaking to a disturbed woman and her two young children. "You couldn't wake up for ten minutes?" scolds Jerry. "The moon blocks out the sun -- big deal. I've got a billboard outside my apartment that does the same thing," Pratt parrots Susan, for no reason I can think of other than that Jack Orman thought it would be cute, which...okay. A puppy would be cute. Can we have one?
Carter exhaustedly skulks over to Pratt, who thoughtfully comments, "You don't look so good." Carter robotically gives him a bunch of bullets: There's a twelve-year-old near-drowning victim who's comatose with no purposeful movements, a six-year-old girl in respiratory arrest from cyanide toxicity, and a Buddhist nun who died. "Reincarnated," Jerry corrects. "Cycle of karma." For a big dumb oaf, Jerry has a lot of random knowledge. Unless he's a closet Buddhist, but I don't think Jerry's a closet anything, as the closet large enough to house him is not in fact a closet, but a room in and of itself. Carter ignores Pratt's banter and points to the dead body of a heart-attack victim whose family is waiting to see him once he's cleaned up from his recent passing and is ready for guests. Carter then swiftly heads for the exit. "All right, see ya, nice knowin' ya," Pratt says, wondering why there wasn't more wailing and gnashing of teeth involved in this, their final goodbye. Carter stops. Pratt reminds Carter that Pratt starts at Northwestern week, and apparently, he had his head shaved and buffed for the occasion. He's positively shiny. There's so much glow bouncing off that thing, you could use it as a flashlight. "Good luck, Greg," Carter says, sort of sincerely. "You too," Pratt nods. Carter busts outta there.
Day shift, 8:14 AM, according to the Graphic of God, We Hope Graphics Win Emmys. There's a giant plot device...er, "truck" blocking the ambulance bay because Weaver is moving the triage area to make room for more beds, in the hope that a construction worker will therefore conveniently pierce himself with something right before the eclipse so that the show can fake one and try to sneak a technical Emmy bid in here. But, I'm getting ahead of myself. I'm sorry if I've spoiled a totally unimportant plot point. Except, not really. Carter meets Chen outside, waiting for a rig to arrive, and watches this bemusedly. "I thought you were on vacation," Chen frowns. "Tomorrow," he says. Apparently, Carter's headed off to Rio de Janeiro with Stephen Keaton to lose their grief under assorted paper drink umbrellas. "Ooh la la, string bikinis," Chen teases. Okay, no. There's little as unappealing as the vision of Carter and Stephen Keaton sitting on the beach in twin nut slings, drooling over half-naked women in bathing suits they can rip off with their teeth. That's all wrong.
An ambulance arrives, and out of it pops a freaking and paranoid woman who ran out into traffic. "There were others, not just me! They were forcing us! They wanted everyone to go together," she moans. She babbles about how the world is ending today at 2:16 PM, and apparently she and her cohorts were playing a rollicking game of Beat The Apocalypse by attempting a good, old-fashioned mass suicide. "Oh, great, and I have to work," Carter mock-complains. "I'm always working when the world ends." We smash into the credits hoping this day/night intercutting begets some dramatic tension, and fast.
Day shift, 8:35 AM, Graphic of We Really, Really Get Off On Graphics. A kid with a blue bandanna wrapped around his skull moans that he can't swallow. It's a sad story: Boy in gang, boy bangs with gang, boy takes a bullet, boy loses control of his throat muscles. As old as the hills, that. "Am I dying?" he asks. "Not if we can help it, but if you keep shooting at each other, we'll run out of blood," Carter preaches. Gallant bursts in to beg for Carter's attention. He's treating the Buddhist nun, who at this point is still alive, but succumbing to breast cancer. Carter informs The Blue Banger that he's got a collapsed lung, and that Elizabeth's going to hang out and reinflate it for him, and then possibly twist it into the shape of a poodle. "Try not to bleed too much," Carter suggests.
Carter exits into a loud room with a loud voice complaining about waiting, and another person wondering who his doctor is. Oh, lord. Mayhem again. Always mayhem. Does Mayhem not have anywhere else to be right now? Does no one else ever employ it, or invite it out for coffee? Carter bumps into Weaver and begs for her aid. "I'm swamped with all these physical improvements," she says. Yeah, optional improvements. Weaver orders Carter to run the show. Again, why? Is he not outranked by other Attendings? And if he's the only organizational whiz, then why is he not an Attending? Carter digests Kerry's remarks and asks if she fired Romano. "No, he's on medical leave," she says. "What? His arm?" Carter asks. Weaver blows him off.
Chen whizzes past and asks if CT is back up. She's with Crazy Apocalypse Woman, who's turned unresponsive. Carter orders a tox screen, while the cop who brought her in hopefully asks whether her unconsciousness means he doesn't have to bother checking out her story that a bunch of people tried to kill her. Carter's like, Remember how you're a cop, bowelmonkey?
A guy in a wheelchair chases Carter down the hall, claiming chronic pancreatitis and that he's puking up his pain pills. "Let me guess: You need a shot of Demerol," Carter yawns. "If you say so, just do it fast," the man begs. Carter's like, Yeah, whatever, you're interrupting my daily mosey. He then moves on to Gallant, who exposits that the Buddhist nun had a mastectomy and radiation chemotherapy, but her surgeon's in Japan and she's not doing so well. Carter then gets a warning that a gunshot victim is ten minutes out; he disappears into the nun's room, perhaps for a breather from the barrage of exposition.
The nun is with her...um, personal assistant? Nun handler? Nun-ette? Not sure. Regardess, her name is Kito, and the nun is called The Venerable Zuin-an. She is bald and weak, and moaning lightly. Carter gently asks if she's comfortable with him giving her a physical exam. Kito translates that Zuin-an is fine with it; she then exposits that the nun is in terrible pain and hasn't had anything to drink in two days. No Diet Coke? No wonder. I'd be bedridden, too. Zuin-an reaches a trembling hand up to Carter's cheek, cupping it weakly. She murmurs something in Japanese. "So much sadness," translates Kito. Carter appears surprised by this diagnosis, as if he hadn't noticed his constant hang-dog expression and general malaise.
With a whoosh, we're transported to the night shift. It's 8:39 PM, according to the Graphic of Oh Shit, Do You Think We'll Blow Our Graphics Budget Before The Commercial? Flames pour out of Doc Magoo's, while the County staff watches with a glee that doesn't jibe with their reliance on the place, much less their grief at the owner's demise. Pratt might as well be doing a jig. "Whoa, somebody overcooked their burger," he jokes idiotically. "That's a first," Jerry giggles. Shut up. The place has been boarded up. Why is it on fire? Susan wonders if it's an electrical problem, which makes sense. Chuny offers up the pointless detail that she's been brown-bagging it since Magoo's closed. Thanks, Chuny. That matters a lot to absolutely nobody. Pratt whines to Susan that he wants her to declare this an internal disaster so that they can be sent home for the night. She chuckles that she wouldn't dream of depriving him of his last shift. Since when can the hospital just close and send everyone home? Do they chuck the patients?
The peanut gallery, grinning incomprehensibly, continues to roast itself by the light of the burning Magoo's. Abby storms out in a foul mood, ignores Susan, and yells at a smoking patient who has a bleeding ulcer. He won't put out his cigarette. "Fine, smoke the whole pack. I'll be inside. Come and find me when you start vomiting blood," she crabs, stomping back into the hospital. "Hey, Abby, Magoo's is on fire," Susan sing-songs annoyingly. "Yeah, I can see that," Abby snaps. What the hell is with these people? Why is Susan twelve? Is Chuck the key to liking her? I have lived my life never having to depend on Donal Logue for anything, and now here I am, mentally begging him to come back. Who would've thought.
Something explodes inside Magoo's, shattering glass and increasing the intensity of the blaze. "Now can we go home?" Pratt asks, hopefully. Piss off, spitbag. Don't demean your greasy spoon this way.
Day Shift. 9:06 AM. Graphic Of Dude, Season, We Could Save Cash By Buying A Tele-strator And Letting Orman and Wells Sit Here And Doodle. Romano lies on a gurney that's parked near the window. He spies an approaching Elizabeth and calls out to her as pleasantly as he ever can. He's supposed to be in pre-op, but got turfed for something that probably pertains to the overcrowding. He tersely requests that Elizabeth write "Not this one, idiot" on his good arm. Her glance is one of the merest tolerance. "Oh, like it doesn't happen," he protests. "I'll be lucky to get out without both legs amputated. I should have you come in with me and stand guard over these gargoyles." As Elizabeth actually does take a marker and start scribbling on his arm, he gazes at her with a more calculated expression and then oh-so-casually says, "You can [watch] if you want to, you know -- if you're bored, or curious." Elizabeth reminds him that she's covering the ER. "They need it more," he martyrs. "I'll scrub in if I can," she promises firmly. Romano stares at her, then reads his arm and testily points out that she forgot to write "Idiot." She sighs and, with a twitch of a smile, repeats that she'll be there for him. "Well, just in case you're not -- 'idiot,'" he prods her. She takes the marker resignedly. If she'd only scribble, "Have a great summer -- stay sweet, don't ever change, BFF," I'd have a renewed respect for her. "Do you think I'm doing the right thing?" Romano gulps. Elizabeth shrugs that her opinion doesn't count here. "That's a position I would usually advocate, but...now, I'm asking," he says, his voice softening nervously. His eyes are afraid, maybe a little sad. "You're doing the right thing," she avers gently.
A man screams that he's got something in his -- oh, God, it's his...toe...and there's metal in it. Luckily, he's wearing a...toe...patch, so that we don't have to look at it. But this is, for all practical purposes, tomfoolery of the toe, and if there is any graphic display of abuse of any part of the foot, there will be trouble. The guy is a firefighter who was in Magoo's when things exploded. A man yells to Pratt that he should check his daughter's beeping ventilator. I should point out that there is no graphic here to help us decide which shift we are watching, so we have to use our -- gasp -- common sense. This leads to headaches! Whither the Graphic Of Excedrin? WHITHER THE GRAPHIC?!
They wheel Firefighter Bob into Trauma Yellow, where a woman and her kids stand, mouths hanging open. They're the family that was waiting to see the head heart-attack man. Pratt can't figure out why they're there; the mother says brokenly, and a little dazedly, that they were supposed to have a chance to say goodbye but the guy got wheeled away already, so they're just standing there to soak up the vibe of his last earthbound minutes. That vibe probably smells a bit like putrid copper and rubber. Pratt is affected by their plight, but he can't move into another room, so the mother quickly escorts her children out. The little boy gazes at Pratt, traumatized, and Pratt stares back. From Trauma Green, Susan screams that she's got a hypotensive gang kid who needs his help. The little boy is still frozen in his tracks. The mother drags him out just as Pratt shakes himself free of the pull of the child's...toes...and bursts through the swinging doors.
Cut to Carter bursting through the same doors. Gallant is treating a kid with a red bandanna on his head and a bullet in his shoulder. We recognize him as Turner, and Gallant recognizes the abdominal wound Turner sustained last week. "And you're out running again?" Carter asks, surprised. Turner spits that the thugs killed his brother and crippled his sister; this is the first confirmation we've had that Curtis is dead, and this is enough for recognition to dawn in Carter's eyes. Turner seems completely unfazed by the metal object that's bored a hole in his body. Apparently, that's one powerful bandanna he's wearing.
Haleh calls Carter away to help with a twelve-year old who fell off a tour boat and was found face-down in the water, so he toddles off. Chen is with the young girl, trying to revive her. She's been down for forty-five minutes. There's a weird bit where Carter frantically orders Chen to stop compressions until they've taken her temperature, because if she's too cold, it could mess her up. But then she turns out to be warm enough and he tells Chen to resume CPR. Chen gives him a funny look and seems kind of miffed, but it doesn't go anywhere. Carter looks over his shoulder at the girl's panicked father and suggests that they try a bladder irrigation. Sexy. That's what happens when I drink too many Diet Cokes in one sitting.
Whoosh. Night shift. The Non-Graphic Of Damn, We Ran Out Of Money For Graphics. Abby is dragging Pratt into the girl's room, saying with amazement that the girl started triggering the vent when they deep-suctioned her, and that just sounds all kinds of illegal, doesn't it? It seems like she's coming back. The father exposits that her name is Heather. Oh, great. I'm dying, I'm pale, I'm unconscious, I'm water-logged, I'm twelve, and Luka is not checking to see if his tongue fits into my mouth. This is not how I wanted to be immortalized on this show. "Heather, can you hear me?" Pratt asks me, squeezing my hand.
From a shot of my hand, we pan up to Carter, who's feeling my pulse. Chen is listening to my chest, and determines that I have a pulmonary edema. My heart is irritable. God, that's certainly true. Carter shines a light in my...toes...Hey, get your fingers off my toelids!
Cut to my point of view; I'm staring at a light Pratt is shining right into my...feet. "Very good. You're doing great, honey," Pratt coos at me. I want to tell him that his suave language doesn't make up for this blatant assault on my toes, but I can't talk, because I'm intubated. Pratt instructs me to take a deep breath and blow as hard as I can. I want to make a rude remark here, but then I remember that I'm merely twelve, and I wouldn't know about such things, because I'm not old enough to be deflowered by my Croatian true love. And I realize the Luka love gets a little insane sometimes in here, but I'm single right now and I've got to get the joys where I can, right?
Carter can't get me to wake up. Luka, hurry up and get here! You have to kiss me before I die! Ooh, but I have a strong pulse now, even though I'm not awake. Hee. I guess Carter gets my heart racing. Who'd have thought it? Eat your heart out, Luka and Gallant! My dad's really scared. Poor guy. At night, Pratt is telling me not to try to talk, because I have a lot of mung to cough up, so while I take care of that, he ushers Dad out of the room for a confab.
Here, the show intercuts Carter delivering my father the bad news with Pratt sharing hopeful, happy test results. Carter begins by telling him that I came here in cardiac arrest, unable to breathe on my own; the camera pans behind my father, so when we emerge on the other side, Pratt is standing where Carter was. He's telling Dad that I'm awake and breathing comfortably. For every piece of bad news Carter delivers -- potential lung damage, brain damage, high chance of death or permanent problems -- Pratt gets to be the contrasting angel of mercy. My brain's fine, and so are my lungs. "Oh, God," my trembling father says to Carter, sinking into a seat. Then, he's shown leaping out of it and onto Pratt, thrilled. Pratt grins wide, like he just ate the canary and didn't get a single feather lodged in his throat. My dad toddles off to see me, and we fade to black thankful that this weird business of the recapper pretending she's recapping herself is finally drawing to a close, because really, it was a tad far-fetched. But I take my imaginary crumbs when I can get them, eh?
Elizabeth charges out of a trauma room and bleats at Carter, "They just keep getting younger, don't they?" She's frustrated at the gang shootings. Carter gets waylaid by the guy who's desperate for Demerol; he's now in a bed, and still wailing. Carter still ignores him.
The nun Zuin-an lies in her quiet sanctuary. She's sleeping. "She says it won't be long," Kito says. "She might be right," Carter says, unaware that the nuns are always right on shows like this, especially when they're unconscious. Kito says that some well-wishers are en route from the temple. Carter backs away, but Kito is feeling the urge to wax loquacious, so she tells the story of how she became devoted to Zuin-an. "She has a gift -- she can see inside of people. She saw inside of me," Kito says. "She was imprisoned for demonstrating for human rights in North Korea, and I was imprisoned for...other things. She saved me. I took it on myself to serve her purpose, but now as I watch her embrace her death and rebirth, I truly understand [that] only through our own acceptance do we realize our purpose." Carter stands there, silent, pretty sure his purpose here is to stand there silently.
Here, the editor intercuts Carter and Pratt treating a string of patients, most of whom are intended as comic relief. Like the woman who acts like a germophobe, or the fat woman who ate a pie. Ha! Fat people! Hi-LAR-ious! Things that are round are silly! Only two patients seem to matter: One, Mr. Dressler, is an overweight man who's been trying to right his ship, but thinks he's in the early throes of a heart attack. The other is Pain Man, who drools to Carter about his pain and how Demerol is the sweetest elixir in the world. Carter crabbily agrees to give him a dose, then flags his chart. The man introduces himself as "Dean -- John Dean."
Cut to the same man telling Pratt that his name is "Haldeman -- Bob Haldeman," and he'd like his Demerol shaken, not stirred. His new story involves back pain and an absent chiropractor, and he snags both another dose of Demerol and another flagged chart, because Pratt isn't buying his song and dance but seems okay with shooting him up anyway. As Pratt and Abby stalk away, shaking their heads, Abby whispers that Mr. Johnson made a biscuit. I love biscuits! Except this biscuit is apparently a turd left on a gurney, which isn't the way I remember the Pillsbury Dough-Boy making them, although maybe I'm just not watching commercials on the right channels. "Jerry, what's the County-to-Northwestern biscuit ratio?" Pratt asks cheerfully. "Oh, eight to one," Jerry decides. "Odds in my favor, baby," grins Pratt. On his way out to meet another gang-banger with a bullet in his body, Pratt passes an old man clutching at his chest who claims a nurse told him to hang out down there. Pratt promises to get to him, and rushes straight past him for a more glamorous trauma.
Susan likes slightly sweaty men in uniforms, it seems. She's just dismounted the Chuck Wagon and now she's flirting up a storm with two men who wield huge spewing hoses for a living. "Isn't the fire outside, boys?" Abby interrupts, scolding. "It's out," one of the firemen says. "Then shouldn't you be rolling up your hoses?" Abby calls over her shoulder as she exits, Susan in tow. "Heading back? Feeding that little spotted dog? Polishing your pole?" Susan stifles a snicker and asks if Abby is cranky or flirting. "What?" Abby scowls. "'Polish your poles'?" Susan quotes with a laugh.
Susan and Abby, with Pratt, greet the latest gang-banger, who's got a bullet wound in his chest. They notice that he's sporting an old one in his shoulder, too, and as Abby gasps at his relative youth, we see his face: It's Turner, shot for the second time in one day and the third time in a week. This time, his composure is gone. He is openly sobbing with fear.
Trauma Green, Carter's shift. He's with Turner, whose lower lip is thrust outward in a mighty pout. "Want me to call your mom?" Carter asks. "She'll kick my ass," Turner postures. She would, too. That wig was powerful stuff. Carter tries to convince him that, at thirteen, he is too young for this and should be looking after his mother and his paralyzed sister now that Curtis is six feet under. Turner doesn't buy this; that downy hair in strange places and his cracking voice indicate that he is, if not all man, then at least a third of one, and that's good enough for him. Carter rips off the kid's bandanna just as Turner sits up and begins removing his tubing. "Someone gotta take care of business," he growls pre-pubescently. "Who's gonna take care of business when you get killed?" Carter lectures.
Chen bursts in and screams that they need the room now. "In a minute," Carter says calmly. Um, Carter? She's yelling, and did you not notice the din of gurneys chugging down the hall? So take your minute and store it deep up your right nostril. Chen breathlessly explains that police found victims of a mass suicide and the survivors are all arriving. Carter packs Turner onto the gurney he was trying to dismount and sends him packing to make room for the new Tertiary Medical Crises Of The Week.
Night. Pratt wheels Turner inside. "My feet! Why can't I feel my feet?" he moans. "Will somebody please call my mom?"
Day. Carter hands Turner some paper and has him jot down his mother's wig's phone number. Then he runs around into the trauma room to check on the incoming victims; apparently, they all drank poison in an attempt to "meet the eclipse," according to the cop. Of sixty people, only ten were still breathing. Carter sniffs cyanide and screams for antidote kits. A woman starts to seize, so Carter runs to her side while Turner watches, then scowls at the ceiling, annoyed that new body hair and a head scarf don't make a lad impervious to bullets.
Night. Susan bursts into Trauma Yellow and screams for the room, so they move out our firefighter friend with the...toe...issue. He wails about losing his sight. Kerry screams that a stab victim is rolling up, as if we needed any more catastrophes in this recap. Turner takes his spot in Trauma Yellow, and starts to crash right as Susan asks him to confirm his mother's phone number. As a gush of blood shoots up onto Pratt's lapel...
...we cut to Carter, who's being splattered in the same spot by what I think is the charcoal they're using on the cyanide victims. Cut to Pratt, who's lost Turner's pulse. His chest is wide open and they're doing internal compressions. Everyone's in a right tizzy. During the day shift, Chen screams to Carter that they've got two more cyanide victims. "We need more docs! Get Weaver!" Carter shouts.
Pratt bursts into a neighboring room. "What happened?" he gasps. Cut to the day shift: "Oh, God," Carter says, charging into a room himself.
Pratt has walked in on Abby with a woman who's bleeding profusely from multiple stab wounds; Carter discovered that one of the cyanide guzzlers is a little girl. Here, the show opts for a split screen: On the left side, we see Carter trying to save the little girl, intubating her while the paramedic gripes that another nine kids were dead at the scene. Carter finds out that there's only one cyanide kit left, and while ordering them to find more antidotes from neighboring hospitals, he decides to give the one kit to the little girl. Chen is worried that the mother's condition needs more medicine than they've got left to offer her, and argues and argues the decision, but Carter snaps at her to shut her up.
On the right side of the screen, Pratt and Abby discover that the girl's been hacked up royally and that she had a baby ripped out of her pregnant uterus. Abby is horrified. She suggests that Pratt deliver the womb, but he isn't too keen on that idea, as it's a rare man who wants to see that come out of the love canal. Abby then tells him to clamp the uterus, which might sustain her long enough to get her into surgery. Pratt gets elbow-deep into this woman's reproductive system, at one point fingering what Abby identifies as a fallopian tube. Pratt would clearly rather not be playing foosball with this woman's ovaries, but he's stuck now, so all he can do is chant to himself, "Porn will make me feel better. Porn will fix everything." Then, he successfully clamps the uterus, and Abby happily reports that the girl's got a pulse. Pratt's relieved.
Carter's little girl has opened her eyes. As he smiles happily at her, he hears distant screaming. Turning around, confused, he sees Turner atop The Blue Banger, wailing on him with a scalpel. Frantically, he bolts in there and takes a flying leap, tackling Turner to the ground. Amid the thrashing, Turner clips Carter in the shoulder with the scalpel. Carter glares angrily at him, then leaps up to check on the gang kid, who's now got a lovely collection of slits on his chest. If you connect them with a Sharpie, you get Donald Duck.
Night. Pratt has resumed trying to save young Turner, whose heart isn't beating. That afternoon, Carter screams for Security, but Turner has already bolted. In front of Pratt, Turner flatlines, just as we see Carter run into the hall after the sprinting kid. "Time of death, 00:28," Pratt says melodramatically, as we see Carter stare after the boy, who escapes from the hospital in slow motion and knocks over a cart for good measure. We fade to black feeling kind of sorry for his mother's wig, which a week ago had two sons and now has none, unless there's a few hiding under there.
As Romano gets wheeled into the operating room, he does that whole crazy "Heyyyy, I'm a patient now" thing where his eyes flicker around and he hears voices as distant echoes. If the show gives him glasses and a spine-ectomy, his transformation into Mark will be nearly complete. Shirley's face appears over the gurney to ask how he's doing. "Never better," Romano says through his teeth. They scoot him onto the operating table, and when they do it, his gown rides up a little. A thousand fanfics are born. He asks who's scrubbing in to assist, and is displeased to hear it's a third-year resident, because all students are jackasses. Romano shivers and is startled to hear that the table is freezing cold. God, if he sprouts anything warm and/or fuzzy on his heart as a result of this experience, I'm going to need some anti-trite medication. "Where's Corday?" he asks impatiently. "I thought she was scrubbing in." Shirley offers to page her in the ER, where she was spied covering a patient, but Romano would rather not act like a ten-year-old with a crush, so he says no. He's got a clip on the finger of his dead arm; I think it's the apparatus they use to take your pulse ox, but I could be wrong; either way, it should be on the arm that's not getting lopped off, and Romano tensely points this out. Shirley's like, Oops, hee, whoops, and Romano's like, If this goddamn arm worked, my middle finger would be romancing your nostrils with a quickness. Then he counts back from ten and succumbs to the anesthesia.
Pratt squeezes some eye drops onto the camera. Aw, it's so nice the way he helps out on the set. Then we cut away, and he's been treating my crazy damaged-toe man. He's got a burned face, and Pratt diagnoses him with a traumatic glaucoma. This doesn't have any bearing on anything at all; I'm just proud that I got all that down.
Abby wheels out Mia, who is Torn Womb Girl. As Pratt tells her that she needs to go into surgery to save her uterus, Mia grabs the chart and scrawls, "Baby?" Pratt gulps that they don't know, and Mia registers that she's upset by wrinkling her brow and meowing. I don't know. She just does.
Carter is with Mr. Dressler, whose chest pain is intensifying. With all the fancy hoo-ha and doo-dads around the hospital, plus the fact that this guy's overweight, clammy, short of breath, and clutching at his chest, Carter has deduced that this is, indeed, a ragingly sprained ankle. No, wait, sorry -- heart attack. Carter smiles that they're going to take him up to the cath lab and unblock his arteries. He offers to call Mrs. Dressler, but apparently she took the kiddies to Lincoln Park to watch the eclipse. But Mr. Dressler left her a message when all this went down, so everything's peachy.
, Carter ducks into a supply closet and rips off his charcoal-stained lab coat. A small red dot is visible on his right shoulder blade; he's bleeding through his shirt. His father is on the phone; Carter picks it up and starts to find out that he's being ditched. Weaver throws open the door and bleats at him, "What the hell happened?" Carter ignores her and tries to listen to his father, but Weaver won't have it, and wants to know where Turner got hold of a scalpel. Oh, please, like instruments are locked down in that place. Her crutch wasn't even safe, and that's never more than a foot from her hand. "Too many patients, not enough staff, not enough medicine," Carter hisses before continuing his conversation. Weaver then decides to rant about why Carter didn't give the cyanide kit to the mother, who had a fatal arrhythmia, and what with the cancellation of his Rio trip and all the death and the giant stain on his snazzy white coat, Carter snaps. "I'm on the phone, Kerry!" he screams. She swallows hard. Carter returns to his father and pleasantly makes plans to reschedule the trip before hanging up. He tersely informs Weaver that when you chug cyanide, your heart goes wonky. She accuses him of undertreating the mother. Carter yanks on some scrubs and spits that the daughter could have died, too, and that she didn't even have a choice about ingesting the poison in the first place. Weaver sighs that she'll take the lead for the rest of the day. Carter's like, Good, finally, nyah-nyah, I win. On her way out, Weaver notices that Carter is bleeding; he groans mildly and exits, quietly asking Malik to run HIV and hepatitis tests on The Blue Banger, whose blood may have mixed with his own. God, we've done this story already. Let it pass, TPTB. You can't revive the glory by reliving the glory days. Just ask Axl Rose.
Malik tells Carter that the cath lab can't take Mr. Dressler for another thirty minutes. "No, now!" Carter barks. "He's losing a heart muscle!" And Mr. Dressler knows it. He looks terrible and he rasps that he's pretty sure he's headed to the great Krispy Kreme in the sky, but before the Fresh Hot Doughnuts sign flickers on, he'd like to write a note to his kids to let them know that they do have chocolate-glazed in Heaven, so it's all going to be okay. Carter nods that he can find a pen and paper, but insists that they have a great chance of fixing him right up. Lydia bursts in right then to grab Carter, and so off he toddles.
Elizabeth quietly enters the operating room just in time to see the surgeon disarticulate Romano's arm at the elbow. I'm not sure exactly what that means, but I imagine it involves a lot of cutting. "He was asking for you," the doctor says. Elizabeth gets all businesslike and scrubs in, which I think is a little weird because they've been friendly lately, but okay, I won't question her judgment because she's been looking really lovely.
Weaver heaves herself up onto a plot device...er, "truck" bed, where a man's lying, having fallen and skewered himself on a rebar. Carter joins them up there, and the gist of it is that they can't yank the thing out, because it's holding everything in right now. This is the convenient excuse for the special-effects people to create the illusion of a solar eclipse right above Kerry's and Carter's worried heads. I see now why they ditched the Graphics Of Yeah, Fine, Okay, If You Can Give Us One Good Reason To Stop Spending Money On These "Day/Night Shift" Graphics, We'll Axe Them Completely And Use The Cash On Something Else.
Pratt notices that the random old man with chest pain still hasn't been treated, so he ignores the fact that a call's coming in for him and sidles over to the old codger. The man is winded, his name is Ray Jamison, and he doesn't have a regular doctor to help treat his chest pain and palpitations. Jerry interrupts that the caller for Pratt has information about Mia's assault; Pratt promises to take care of Ray, and then buzzes off to take the call. "Yeah, she's alive," he says into the phone. Then he gasps, "What?"
Gallant steals Carter away from Man-Kebab because the Buddhist nun is having serious lung problems. Weaver tells him to go, because she can handle Man-Kebab herself, what with him not exactly going anywhere just now.
Abby frantically grabs supplies. "In the alley?" she gapes "Why didn't he just bring it in?" Pratt says that the mystery caller's wife came home with a baby and claimed she gave birth while at work. There are many reasons why this man's wife is both stupid and insane, but one certainly is that she tried to pass off a fully gestated baby as having come from her not-pregnant belly. The levels of her psychosis are many, but woman, if you're going to be psycho, be smart about it. Abby yells for Susan to set up for a neo-natal resuscitation.
The nun is in pain. Carter offers to give her some morphine, but says it will hurt her breathing. A bunch of bald dudes in religious garb are there, ready to sing Zuin-an to her rest. They all approve of him administering the medicine, which basically means they know she's about to die and they're just really eager to whip out the gongs and get this party started.
Chanting begins. Gonging begins. That sound carries us through a bunch of moments spliced together: Abby and Pratt desperately seeking the baby in the north alley, construction men cutting the rebar so they can carry Man-Kebab downstairs, and Romano's arm getting hacked off by a whirring bone saw. Ew, that's so nasty. It sounds like an episode of Trading Spaces, and I half expect to see Ty Pennington running around with the arm, using it to pick people's noses and pat their hair and wank himself. ["Part of me can't believe ER is ripping off a device -- the montage over the funereal Buddhist chanting -- that Six Feet Underused a year ago, and another part of me is just proud that ER knows enough to steal from its betters." -- Wing Chun]
The nun continues to expire. Susan shows up in the alley with a car and flicks on the headlights to help the search for the baby. The surgeon offers to let Elizabeth make the final chop on Romano's arm, but she refuses a tad queasily, choosing instead to actually pick up the damn thing and drop it into what looks like an industrial-sized Ziploc bag. Good. It'll stay fresher longer this way. Once she lets go of the arm, Elizabeth exhales and looks a bit shaky, certainly moved by what just happened to Romano.
The nun Zuin-an draws her last breath as the chanting slowly grinds to a halt. Over a shot of her still, placid face, we hear a baby cry, because when this show can't think of anything else to do, it turns to (a) babies, and (b) the juxtaposition of life and death. Pratt spies the baby behind some fencing and pulls it out; he, Abby, and Susan stand there cooing at the thing, and we fade to black wondering if they know that it's Rex the Wonder Preemie, and that the evil little tyke might well have chopped himself out of the uterus just to make trouble.
And, oh, there's the money: sweaty, panting Luka. He's calling Carter from the Congo to beg for help -- one doctor got evacuated, and another is detained because of visa trouble. Luka still harbors the notion that Carter has State Department contacts that can finesse the situation, but sadly, the only finesse Carter has comes in a blue bottle. Carter chuckles mirthlessly that his family friend used to be the Ambassador to Uruguay, but that Carter has never even met him; Luka still wishes Carter would put in the call. As Carter watches the mourners pay respects to the dead Zuin-an, he listens to Luka talking about the cholera epidemic and the refugees and the immigration problems. A lightbulb flickers on over Carter's head: He too could become a Buddhist nun, and shave his head, and carry percussion instruments with him in case rhythmic chanting is required. But Luka's voice interrupts the glories of this daydream, so Carter offers to pitch in for a few weeks, having had his shots and being in possession of a valid visa. Luka is happy to hear it, but they get disconnected, and my dose of sweaty satisfaction is over.
Mr. Dressler still hasn't made it up to the cath lab, and now he's in arrest. Carter is furious that no one helped him sooner, and Malik defensively tells him that the cath lab staffers weren't sitting around playing drinking darts all this time -- they were busy, and they said so. They bag Dressler.
Pratt coos at the baby while he, Susan, and Abby examine him. The kid's fine, and Pratt's grinning at him like a complete goofball. It's actually kind of cute, mostly because Rex the Wonder Preemie vacated the premises to go tapdance on Mr. Dressler's ticker, requiring that the show put a real baby in his infamous place. And the baby is google-worthy. "He's a screamer," he grins. "Wouldn't you be? Ripped from your mother's womb by some lunatic?" Susan tsks. "Hell of a way to come into the world," Abby nods. Yeah, but the kid won't remember it. Not to minimize the trauma, but seriously, the kid won't know the difference, whereas I'm pretty sure Mia will not soon forget the sensation of being given an under-the-bleachers C-section. Pratt takes over and decides to bring the baby up to Mia. Abby and Susan shoot him amused grins, so he stiffens and makes up a bogus medical reason why he should be the one to carry the little tyke up there. Pratt practically skips away singing about the wonders of life.
And speaking of life, it's seeping out of Mr. Dressler. His family arrives just in time to watch Carter struggle to revive the man. Carter spies them and asks Malik to hand over the letter. Malik's like, This man's dying and you want the what now? "He asked for a pen and paper. To write his kids," Carter demands angrily. "Didn't you give him the pen and paper?" Malik swears that Dressler never asked him for that, and as he was speaking, Carter realized he's the one who dropped that particular ball. Gritting his teeth, he throws himself into CPR.
Quietly, Elizabeth clamps off a small bleeder on Romano's stump. "Don't contaminate the field," he slurs. Elizabeth seems amused. "Robert, it's Elizabeth," she says slowly. "Lizzie," he says, groggy. "She's one hell of a surgeon. So beautiful." Elizabeth finishes what she's doing and gives us our first glance at Romano's stump, which is...stumpy. "You're taking good care of me," he drools. "I'm trying, yes," she says, entertained. Romano is still all Lizzie In the Sky With Diamonds, so he slurs, "I love you, Elizabeth," and she just sits there for a second before realizing that the way to handle this is to blame it on the crazy drugs, and then borrow some for herself. Barely missing a beat, and certainly not appearing to take it seriously -- or at least as any kind of problem or temptation -- Elizabeth calls for a fresh dressing and promises to check on him later.
We dissolve from Romano and his stump to Mia, to whom the baby appears. Pratt has wheeled him in, and proudly introduces Mia to her son. She's delighted.
Dressler is a goner. He's been down for sixty-two minutes, and even Carter, the King of Hey, Baby, I Can Go All Night If You Want Me To, has to admit that no amount of pumping will revive this man. Angrily, he tears off his gloves and faces the terrified Mrs. Dressler and her wide-eyed moppets. This is the scene Pratt witnessed at the beginning of the show when he looked down the hall and saw Carter talking to a random family; this is why Carter was in such a crap mood way back then. Except that then is now. This is so Spaceballs. I'm channeling Rick Moranis somehow. Tiredly, Carter explains that Dressler went into arrest just as they were wheeling him upstairs for special attention. "I couldn't get him back," Carter chokes. The moppets widen their eyes. "Did he know what was happening?" asks Mrs. Dressler, stunned, her eyes fast becoming lakes. "He wanted me..." Carter begins, staring down at the children. "To, uh, tell you that he loved...loves...you all very much," he finishes with difficulty.
We're now in the morning phase of the night shift. I almost miss the Graphic of We'll Tell You What Time It Is When We Bloody Well Want To, Smartass. Pratt hands off a bunch of patients to Chen, and then introduces her to his prize patient, Ray Jamison. He's proud of himself for picking up a heart flutter and basically saving the man's life. I guess this is the dawn of Pratt's realization that simple doctoring on seemingly minor cases can be just as rewarding as the sexy adrenalin-charged emergency cases. And I'm sure we're all thrilled to hear it. Jamison looks happy. "I'll come see you at your office," he says. "This is my office," Pratt replies. "Or, was. I just work in the hospital." Jamison thinks that's sad, because Pratt is "a fine doctor," and evidently all fine doctors should have private practices, leaving emergency work to the oafs. Pratt thanks him gratefully, lays a kiss on Chen, and surfs on outta there. "Congratulations, Greg," Chen smiles. "You survived the County experience." Pratt beams. "Oh, no, not just survived it," he says. "I whooped its ass."
Cut to Carter's whooped ass. Pratt got all the rejuvenation, and Carter got all the disappointment and disconnect. He looks completely lost as he skulks out of the hospital -- and bumps into Abby. "Hey," she says, uncomfortable but with a flash of hope in her eyes. She tries to make small talk about the eclipse but he's not having it, and she notices the extra bit of weariness in his expression. "You have a rough shift?" she asks, worried. Carter begins to explain about Dressler and how he whiffed on the pen-and-paper request, but can't really squeeze out the whole story. "Nothing's right here," he finally says, turning to leave. Abby watches him go for a second. "Hey, I haven't seen you in a week! That's it?" she says, frustrated, all but stomping her foot. Carter shrugs, emotionless. "Luka called me," she blurts. "He was under the impression I might know where you were." Carter turns and their eyes meet, and Abby's face says it all. I wholeheartedly disagree with people who think she was playing the ex-boyfriend card; it seems clear to me that what she's saying here is that she knows of only one reason why Luka might be needing to reach Carter, and she's upset she had to hear it this way, rather than from Carter himself. Also, she's afraid to see him go. "You're going, right?" she finally asks. "To Africa?" Carter nods. "It's not Rio, but...it's not here," he says emptily, leaving. Abby stares after him, fighting being hurt, and eventually turns to walk inside, wringing her hands.
The Magoo's fire is getting into full swing as Carter leaves. He stares at it for a second, then stares back at County; possibly he realizes that for all his bitching about being understaffed, he's about to leave County majorly in the lurch -- and also would have done if he'd jetted off to Rio -- but it's clear he doesn't much care. Muffin's had a bad day.
We pan up and over to the El station, and then to the top of a speeding train; when it passes, it's daytime, and we pan around to the rubble that was Doc Magoo's. Pratt fishes around and picks up an old First Aid kit that looks oddly like a cross between a Bible and a Hell's Angel's address book. Weaver spots him in there and asks how his last shift went. He smiles that it was exciting, so she shrugs that he's always welcome to return when he's bored because they need the help. Wouldn't they have made arrangements to replace him, though? This hospital is so badly run.
Haleh runs out and yells that Pratt forgot to write Mr. Jamison his prescription. Pratt says that Chen can do it, but then gets caught up in the details of the dosage and the after-care. Pausing in his stride, Pratt stares at the ground for a second. The Music Swell Of Somebody's Just Gone Through A Major Change lifts just as Pratt's head snaps up and he says, "Let me write it." And as he plans Mr. Jamison's treatment, he says out loud that he'll still be there week. "I thought you were going to Northwestern," Haleh says. "Nah, I guess I'm more of a Southside doc," Pratt replies glibly. Okay, what? His dream was Northwestern, he goes through one shift that has more happy endings than sad ones, and suddenly he wants to stay at the place he's repeatedly deemed a shithole? That makes no sense. And suddenly, I suspect its illogic matches that which keeps me recapping this show week to week. So as Pratt returns to the scene of this plot crime, we fade to black, rejoicing that there's only one more episode left before a really nice, long summer break. Boo-ya.