Previously on Egos Rising, new nurse Sam Taggart showed up with a cocky swagger and tried to win our hearts with Haldol and a scruffy young son. It didn't work. Luka took charge with a plan to clear triage much faster. Abby began a surgical rotation as part of her return to medical school. And finally, Bob Newhart promised Susan that he wouldn't kill himself yet.
We fade up on Bob Newhart's little toy village. Susan is at his apartment reading aloud to him, ostensibly in an effort to keep the lonely man's spirits high. But as she's droning a passage involving the words "melancholy," "death," and "funeral," I'd say she's not doing such a spectacular job. Bob interrupts her oration by coaxing a loud "thwppppt" noise from the bowels of his espresso machine, something I gleefully imagine to be a subtle protest of the endless, monotonous dirge that is Susan's company in this moment. Susan rattles off a couple of quick questions about his meds. "Coffee does the same thing," Bob says of one of his pills. "It also raises your blood pressure," Susan tsks. "Luckily, you gave me a pill for that, too," Bob says dryly. As he shuffles back to his work bench, Susan continues to intone very dramatic things from a dense and boring book, and Bob begins to wonder if perhaps Susan could add to his drug pile by putting this moment in pill form and prescribing it to him for nights when he has trouble sleeping. Then he evidently gets a better idea. "You don't have to keep doing this," he suggests. "I have time to finish," she protests. "I've never read this before. It's good!" Bob frowns. "You don't have to keep coming here," he says. "I don't have this book," Susan counters. "Keep it," Bob offers. "I'm never going to read it again." Susan explains, "That's why I'm here. That, and the coffee." What's with Susan being The One Who Cares Too Much? First Patrick Fugit, and now this. Can't she take an unnecessary stalker-like interest in a patient her own age?
Bob apparently decides to give Susan a taste of her own medicine by dispensing some depressing trivia designed to send her fleeing in search of some bliss. "[Stephen Crane] died at twenty-nine," Bob says of the author. "Nice. Very cheery," Susan breezes. Apparently, she's reading The Red Badge of Courage. And based on these featured excerpts, I will not be. Susan opens her mouth and burps up the following apt sound bite: "'Though he adopted toward him an air of patronizing good humor, his self-pride was not entirely restored.'" Bob frowns his jowls clear down to his shoulders. There will be no sweet release from tedium today.
Frank and Sam, juggling coffees and donuts, cross the street from the site of the old Doc Magoo's, which has apparently turned into a convenience store of sorts. Frank of course loves Not Magoo's, because they're giving away free donuts today. Keep that up and they'll have to give out free Dexatrim as well. A woman in a cab calls out to them weakly as she tries to get out. Sam stops to help her. "I think I'm having a miscarriage," the woman says. She's redheaded actress Allison Smith (recently of The West Wing), but I will call her Jenny, after her character on Kate & Allie, because to me she will always be that awkward kid with the horrible blond dye job. Trivia: She can sing very well. Jenny tells Sam she's twenty-four weeks along, her first pregnancy to get this far. She looks scared. Sam helps Jenny inside.
Jerry proudly shows off a little Labrador puppy to Chen. Don't do it, Jerry! She'll kick it! He exposits that it's the last of a litter her found outside his apartment; I'll call it Twopper, because that's the name the forum has chosen, and this isn't a dictatorship, except for when I bloody well say it is. Chen picks up Twopper and -- despite the fact that Twopper will undoubtedly threaten her imagined reign as Queen Hottie of the ER -- she resists the urge to drop-kick the little beauty into the county. Jerry's trying to find a home for Twopper. Coop can't take him because "dogs irritate [his] asthma," and Chen says that her building doesn't allow pets since the super caught her shoving the neighbor's ferret into her cauldron.
A pretty drug rep named Terra, clad in a red power suit, shows up with swag to hand out to the residents. Jerry delightly shows her where she can set up her table. Rolling her eyes, Chen hands Twopper off to Lester, who coos at the puppy, and makes her way toward the television. There, Pratt, Coop, and Malik are watching a car chase on the news. "Punch it, cat daddy," Pratt says inexplicably. I hate cats. Shut up, Pratt. "He'll have to get on Lower Wacker to lose the copter," Pratt says before Sam yanks him away to help pregnant Jenny.
Lester is perplexed by the staffers' cheering, and thinks they're rooting for the carjacker to get away. But they aren't. "We want him to go a few blocks," Chen explains. "Once he's south of Van Buren, he goes to Mercy." Enthusiastically, they start cheering on the driver as he speeds onto the expressway. "There's always a crash," winces Coop prophetically, just as the driver smashes into someone on the ramp. "Yes! Yeah, go! Ohhhh...dammit," the group groans. We smash into the credits hoping those words make a nice little sandwich out of themselves, with some mustard and turkey and lettuce and maybe even some cucumber, and ram themselves down their throats. Also, we're laughing. But only a little.
When we return, Elizabeth is giving Abby a little lecture about dealing with the scoundrels in the ER. "Don't let them take advantage of you," Elizabeth advises. "The patient was borderline," Abby points out. Elizabeth says that such a patient should stay under observation in the ER until such time as his or her condition becomes more clear. "They're only too happy to free up beds by dumping patients onto surgery," Elizabeth complains. She cracks Abby's spine for optimal rigidity, then sends her down for another consult.
Lester, Coop, and Neela watch Luka breeze through diagnosing a bunch of patients. In all cases, he orders the absolute minimum of tests and dispos the patients with little fanfare. It feels a bit like a series of one-night stands, so of course it makes sense that Luka would gravitate to this method and do it well. "Coop, your subconjunctival hemorrhage happened from sneezing and will get better in a week. Reassure your patient that he won't go blind and get him out of here," Luka says, crossing out a few names on the board. Romano, eavesdropping in the background, applauds. I guess this solves that age-old riddle. "What is the sound of one hand clapping?" Romano is impressed with Luka's speed. "Five patients in two minutes, that's some kind of record," he says. "Just make sure you're not skimping...on the billing. Check off a few more boxes time." Luka tells Romano rather haughtily that he won't charge people for treatment he doesn't provide. He's been sensitive about that ever since a hooker overbilled him. Romano counters, "It's called capitalism, Kovac. It pays your salary."
Pratt gives Jenny an ultrasound and pronounces the baby healthy. But she's dilated three centimeters already, meaning that what she's feeling is labor. Panicked, Jenny whines that she's had two miscarriages, and she can't go through one again. Pratt promises to give her some medicine that will hold off labor so that the baby can grow a bit more. Then he throws one of those small kidney-shaped vomit dishes at her in case the magnesium makes her ill, or I suppose in case the baby drops out and needs a place to sleep.
Jerry alights on Pratt's shoulder to Exposition Fairy that the car-crash victim will arrive in under two minutes. Then Neela presents the case of a young woman with a sudden headache but no history of migraine, and in sum, Pratt orders a head CT to rule out a subarachnoid hemorrhage. The first time I typed that, it was "subarachnid hemorrhage," and I had this horrific image of a brain tarantula running around and breeding on the cerebellum. It was a very Dali moment.
I guess that took two minutes, because the thing we see is the carjacker being wheeled in on a gurney. He seems fine, if a little out of it. "Should've turned left on Stanton, Sparky!" Coop chirps. Sparky growls that he'd have gotten away if that jerk hadn't cut him off -- yes, that jerky jerk, the jerkiest jerksmack of all, rudely obeying both the laws of man and the laws of traffic while a car thief was trying nobly to flee faster than Carter from a Lockhart family reunion. Pratt pushes down hard on Sparky's clavicle, causing Sparky to moan in agony, and smugly diagnoses a fracture. He shoves the gurney off to Trauma Green.
The victim comes in . His name's Thomas -- and not Jerksmack, as previously hinted by Sparky's damning testimony. His lips part. There's a great bubbling. And before Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan can leap down his gullet in a grand suicide pact, the volcano erupts blood. It looks like the science-fair project that beat mine in sixth grade. Mine was about mold. I had the makings of penicillin growing on bread and cheese. Fuck lava -- I was a household chemist. I called my project "Spoil Spores." It was amusing at the time.
Sam bumps into Susan and tells her that a Mrs. Walters in Exam Two needs TLC and some Zoloft. Wow. Last week, Zoloft made mothers drop babies, but this week it's a warm embrace. That's what I like to call Realizing Your Writers Want Some Free Samples. The two women watch the residents and students giggling with Terra as she hands out pens and clocks and water bottles and blowjobs, all embossed with the name of Drug du Jour. Sam comments that one hospital she worked at tried banning drug reps, but because they lost out on all the freebies that way, all the residents complained. So? Since when are these places democracies? "That's how they get you hooked," Susan sighs. "Free food, free equipment...." "Don't forget the boobs," Sam interjects. "I imagine they have to pay for those," Susan snarks. "Keep Kovac away from her. He's been known to give away free physicals." Oooh, meow.
Sam sits down behind the triage glass and speaks with a homeless guy named Ernie. "I got worms," he says, lifting his sleeve to show a nasty squiggle of maggots. That is so disgusting. Ew. Chop off as many arms as you need to, TPTB, but warn me first if you're going to assault me with maggots. It's just decent.
An angry man abruptly bangs against the window. "What's this?" he sneers, slapping a piece of paper against the plexiglass. Sam keeps her cool. "Looks like a hospital bill," she observes, sending him to accounting on the third floor. "They wouldn't help me," he says. "I can't either," Sam shrugs. The man punches the window and shouts that he was there for eleven hours with a sick kid, only to be told that the kid had a virus and would get better on his own. "Did he?" Sam asks, arching an eyebrow. Angry Dad tenses up and then screams, "They didn't DO anything for him! And I get a bill for over two grand!" He demands to see Carter, who billed him. Months ago, since he was barely back in town from Africa before trotting back over in the name of man-love and then pitching a tent for Debbie. Sam calmly tells Angry Dad that Carter doesn't work at County anymore and tries to deal with Ernie's maggots, but Angry Dad won't have it, charging at the glass with an object he hopes will break it. Ah, but it's ire-proof. "I want this fixed! Are you gonna do something about this bill?" yells Angry Dad. A security guard tackles him in a blur. "Nope, but he is," Sam deadpans.
Luka gets called to the side of a kid named Zack, best recognized from his stint as Jack's son on Will & Grace. Zack fell six feet onto gravel and suffered some light lacerations and some pain in his shoulder. Zack insists that his shoulder is fine. He looks miserable. The weight of his teen angst is oppressive. He's gloomy and angry, and I'm almost afraid at what explosions may come when he gets his first zit. Luka asks for an x-ray, and tells Zack that he'll need some stitches. "We'll numb you up," Luka smiles. "No, uh, no medicine. I can take it," Zack says gruffly.
In Trauma Yellow, Pratt and Abby are working on Thomas, whose prospects seem grim considering that his...toes...are awash in blood. He looks like Satan. It's disgusting, and I don't want to know how they did it on-set. Thankfully, time we see him, he's been given a pedicure. Lily runs around doing things with her hair all over the place, and Pratt orders Abby to start an IV. "Nurses start IVs," Abby corrects him. "Surgical students do cutdowns." Exasperated, Pratt shouts for a central line kit.
Chen toddles into Trauma Green, where Neela and Coop are working on Sparky. Coop preps for a Sonosite. "Show Dr. Chen what you know," Coop encourages Neela. She reads the Sonosite and tells Chen that there's fluid in the abdomen and pericolonic gutter. Chen grabs the Sonosite from Coop and moves it herself. "You could use a little more jelly on your belly," she says. Coop's expression is all, "Yeah, baby, so could you, and I can help." Neela correctly identifies this as an intra-abdominal injury that requires surgery. Chen can't find fault with this diagnosis, so she hurriedly exits the room in order to choke back the jealous ire I assume is bubbling like a witch's brew in her throat. "Be right back," she mutters. "Don't be a stranger," pants Coop. I like "pants" and "Coop" in the same sentence. There's so many fun ways to go with that one.
Chen trots into Trauma Yellow and says boredly, "The guy door needs a surgeon." He has a name, Bitchmaggot. Abby moves to call Elizabeth. "'Mommy, mommy, come save me,'" snarks Romano, who has appeared in the trauma room to dispense his uniquely cloying and repellent brand of impatient sarcasm. He shoos Abby door with Chen and announces that he will make the final decision.
Abby shuffles into Trauma Green. "Surgery's here," she says. "Hello, Surgery," Coop says pleasantly. He then asks Abby to turn off the beeping monitor, which she does with a swift thump of the hand. Not swift enough, though; Romano enters expecting a bullet, and Abby hasn't even had time to load the gun. This elicits yet another stream of undiluted derision from Go-Go-Gadget Deep Psychological Scars. "So you're a med student, a nurse, and a technician now," he sasses. "What's ? Cowgirl?" Pratt ducks in and tells Abby that he's going to push Thomas's drugs. "Want in on this?" he asks. "Yes," Abby says. But Romano wants an evaluation. Abby seems torn and indecisive, so Neela offers to go with Pratt, and Romano dispatches her. "Well?" Romano barks at a thrown Abby, who shakes off the momentary confusion and begins her evaluation with a nervous glance at her bitchmaster.
Luka cleans up Zack's head while telling him that his shoulder's not broken -- the ligaments are just a bit strained. "Told you," Zack sighs. "Maybe you should be a doctor," Luka banters. "Not with my grades. I almost failed lunch," Zack cracks emptily. Frank leads over a dark-haired guy who introduces himself as Ron. "I'm a social worker from Stadler House. Zack's one of our residents," Ron says. Zack tenses. "Prisoners," he spits. Apparently, Zack hopped a fence and ran off during an outing. "I escaped, you Nazi," Zack hisses. Ron frowns at him disapprovingly as Luka looks on, concerned. Zack whispers that he's not going back there. Zack doesn't realize that, on television, the likelihood of your returning to the hell from which you came is directly proportionate to the number of times you beg to be saved. Especially if you're an adolescent, because that doubles the tragedy factor. Ron insists that Zack has a conduct disorder; Zack cusses him out, and Luka tries to maintain order. "He's off his meds," Ron argues. Zack kicks out at him and misses, so Luka orders Ron back to the waiting room. Zack begs Luka again not to let them take Zack back with them, and we fade to black on Luka's concerned expression, which is not least due to the proximity of Zack's hair-trigger foot to Luka's own much-coveted groin.
When we return from the break, Romano is shipping Sparky up to the OR. "If it comes out, you owe me and Chen a beer," Coop says to Romano. I'm not sure what "it" is, or why Coop butchered his grammar like an axe murderer, but I'm far less concerned about both those things than I am about his apparent, budding interest in our girl Bitchmaggot. "I'm more of a cosmo girl," Chen says. "The drink or the magazine?" Coop leers. "A little of both," she says. Coop's intrigued, because this means that in the last few months she will have read approximately 182 Things That Will Drive Him Wild, 100 Sex Secrets, Our Top 50 Sexual Positions, 42 Things He Wishes You'd Do, and 63 Things He Really, Really Wishes You'd Do But Is Afraid To Ask Because They Mostly Involve Lesbian Trysts. And, a bonus crop of hilarious tampon gaffes.
In the hallway, Thomas and Sparky collide one last time -- this time on gurneys; Sparky's headed to salvation and Thomas's headed back into Trauma Yellow so that he can live out his last hours in a dingy cesspool. Romano asks Abby if Neurology agreed with their general assessment that Thomas is fucked, and she assents. "He's brain-dead?" Neela asks. "Yeah," Abby nods. "The bad guy gets patched up, and the victim ends up a vegetable." She says this like it doesn't happen all the freaking time at County General. This can't be the first time she's seen evil prevail over good. I mean, she saw herself dye her hair that color, for one thing. Romano points out that Sparky hasn't been saved yet, and orders Abby to change Thomas's head dressing, lest she actually have designs on completing her surgical rotation by participating in actual surgical procedures. She wants to know where Sparky's going, but Romano orders her to stay in the ER until the UNOS team arrives for Thomas.
Zack twitches as Luka stitches him up. Luka offers him some numbing gel, but Zack counters that he's been doped up on so many drugs the past six months that he's just happy to feel anything at all. They had him on Tegretol, Lithium, Rispedal, Clonidine, Klonopin, and...Benadryl? What, was he a head case with a raging dust allergy? A delinquent with a huge susceptibility to head colds? It seems Zack normalized by cheeking his pills to avoid swallowing them: "Today's the first day I've felt normal in months. I got tired of being a freakin' zombie." He repeats his plea not to let anyone send him back to his drug prison, further driving a nail into his coffin. "We'll talk when your mom gets here," Luka says.
Luka grabs some films and checks them, then sets off for Pratt. "This scan's negative," Luka says. "I'm still waiting on a neurological consult for a subarachnoid," Pratt says. "Did you do an LP?" Luka jargons. Pratt wanted to wait. Luka rails at him for wasting time and resources, and then notices that Pratt's with another patient. "What's his problem?" Luka asks, irritably. "Besides being tackled in the waiting room?" the man spits. It's Angry Dad, looking less irate and more helpless as he's tucked up all comfy in a bed. Pratt says he might be an angina case, so he ordered a battery of tests. Impatiently, Luka rattles off a series of standard questions and deduces that the sudden chest pain came after Angry Dad got decked in triage. "It's an anxiety attack," Luka duhs to an annoyed-looking Pratt. "Over this stupid hospital bill!" Angry Dad cries, thrusting it at Luka. Scanning it, Luka cuts the charges down to three-hundred dollars, announces that half the billed tests were unnecessary, and throws it back at Angry Dad. "Thanks," he says, surprised.
"Hey, Slavko, what do you think this is, a Zagreb Yugo dealership?" Romano seethes. No, silly -- if Luka thought it was a dealership, he'd be offering a lot more test-drives of his hot rod. "On the rare occasion that we do get a patient with insurance, we don't give them deals!" Romano spits. "I expect that kind of idiocy from Pratt, not from you." Luka largely ignores this and sets up shop at the front desk computer so that Abby can sneak up behind him. "I thought I was his favorite," she teases. Luka chuckles.
Drug rep Terra slinks up to the desk and brightly pimps her drug, Quinamex. Luka is not impressed by her slick pens and her red power suit and the whore-crimson lipstick that's begging to end up as the laundry-room condemnation on a married man's white collar. Luka pokes holes in Terra's sales pitch, but mercifully, that's all he pokes with her right now. Terra turns to Abby and brightly points out that the pill is ideal for cellulitis. Abby blinks at her. She punctuates a lot of scenes that way.
Susan grabs Sam and tells her to keep an eye out for Bob, because Susan's in the mood for some intense and ultimately doomed emotional attachment today. She then gets sidelined by Pratt, and engages in a completely incomprehensible discussion. "Check it out -- I can rattle off a bunch of crazy shit no one understands unless they blew their wad on med school," Pratt says. "And the longer I keep talking, the more people will respect me." Susan nods. "I thought it would get me more jobs, but it didn't, which is why I came back to the show," she says. "Yeah, I was in movies with Eminem and Julia Stiles, so I figured I should stick with this show as long as it'll agree to pay me," Pratt says. "Also, did you catch that word I just dropped? I think it was the longest one yet." Translation: Jenny's still in labor and it's not stopping, so they're going to send her up to delivery. This show says in a hundred words what it could say in seventeen. Bored, Susan quits the scene.
Frank sidles up to Pratt and points out that he'd better claim his territory, because Chen is apparently flirting with Coop. He knows this because she's touching her hair and laughing with her mouth open wide enough to show all her teeth. If I were Coop, I'd take this egregious show of choppers as a cautionary sign that reads, "Enter at your own risk." But Frank contends that being a cop taught him all about body language. Because God knows he didn't learn about flirting from personal experience with women. "Look, she's mirroring his motion," Frank says. Sure enough, both Chen and Coop are fingering their stethoscopes and mooning at each other. The praying mantis always looks pretty until she eats her mate. Frank bets Chen'll touch Coop , and she does, giggling and tapping his arm flirtatiously. "First it's a slap, then it's a tickle," Frank says. "Before you know it, she'll be spanking his ass." Pratt's all, Don't I know it.
Jerry passes by, clutching the puppy, holding a urine tray under its legs. "I need a fire hydrant," he sighs. Susan reappears, squeals with delight, and asks to hold the puppy. "You can have it," Jerry says.
Neela gives Pratt the bullet on one of her patients: he's got kidney stones. She ordered a CBC, chem. panel, and a CT. Pratt adds an IV push to the list, but a nearby Luka overhears this and once again puts the kibosh on all the tests. I wish he'd been my high-school physics teacher. Luka insists that the tests are too expensive and gobble up nursing time. He prescribes some medicine and a quick ultrasound. "Then we won't see where the stone is," Pratt complains. "Ninety percent of cases pass on their own," Luka says. "What if it's too big to pass?" Pratt fires back. "Then he'll come back," duhs Luka, passing back the chart. Neela watches all of this, a little scared and fascinated and wishing she were more than just a pawn in a pissing match, soaking up all the fetid backsplash. "He still thinks he's in the Congo," Pratt snorts. "Get the CT." He shoves the chart back into Neela's arms and she stares at it, confused.
Romano continues to ride Abby's ass in a way Carter always wanted to, but never did. "You need to take him up," he spits. "That's not how it works," Abby says. "I come down, I see him, I present." Romano doesn't appreciate getting a lesson from a book he helped to write, so he pulls Go-Go-Gadget Rank and tells her that as the former head of Surgery and the current ER chief, he is ordering her to take Joe Whoever up to surgery. Abby's trying to do what Elizabeth said -- which is, stand her ground against people who either know her or want to cow her into acquiescence -- but Romano isn't making it easy. "What do you need me to do, write a damn note?" he hisses. "Dear Dr. Corday, please admit Abby's patient. He's very sick today and he requires an ex-lap before he gets septic and dies!" He then storms off in a pool of his own bile. Susan peeks her head around a corner. "Hanging in there?" she asks with a grin. "By a thread," Abby sighs.
Gingerly, Neela approaches Susan for advice about the conflicting orders she's getting from Pratt and Luka. "Kovac is the attending," Susan says as her answer. You know, it just occurred to me that Chen, Susan, Romano, and Luka are all on duty at the same time. That's four attendings, because I think Romano counts as such. How is it that some nights there's only one, and here, there are four? I mean, besides the fact that the writers are on hallucinogens. Also, while we're at it, where are all the new nurses that flooded the place two episodes ago? Or the petulant regulars that walked out three episodes ago? And where the hell is Haleh? Am I going crazy?
Sam interrupts Susan, Neela, and Abby to introduce Thomas's wife, Patricia. Abby introduces herself. "I'm Neela. I worked on your husband," Neela says gently. "Would you like to see him?" She offers to escort Patricia back to the trauma room while Abby awaits the UNOS team. As they leave, Abby frowns at Neela's cool, efficient earnestness. "I'm beginning to hate her," Abby says good-naturedly. "Eh, she's a med student," Susan says by way of comfort, or something. There's a pause, then Abby shakes herself. "I'm a med student!" Abby says. "You know, now that you mention it, she's pissing me off, too," Susan covers quickly. "Come on, let's hate her together." They giggle their way off-set.
Pratt breaks the news to Jenny that the medicine hasn't stopped her labor. She gives the usual aggrieved exposition that all patients give -- the kind that no one asked for but which is supposed to make us die a little inside as they suffer. In this case, Jenny's husband's in Seattle on business, and she'd insisted she'd be fine, but ah, she's not, and now she's alone. "I can't believe I'm having another miscarriage," she says, but she doesn't look sad so much as annoyed. Maybe she's just deadened by all the loss. "No," Pratt corrects her with a smile. "You're having the baby. I'm sending you to Obstetrics." Jenny, startled, snaps that she doesn't want no stinkin' preemie. Pratt tries to point out that County's NICU cares for babies like this every day. "Babies with brain damage," Jenny snorts. "My sister had a preemie...they spent every day in the NICU and it still died." Pratt protests that Jenny's baby still has a chance. "I don't want it this way!" snaps Jenny. Pratt's thinking, "Tough munchies, babe, 'cause it's comin'," and you can see it's not the first time he's had this thought with a woman.
Pratt skulks to the front desk, discouraged. Susan asks what's wrong, and he fills her in on Jenny's reluctance to have the baby. A listening Abby asks for details, and Pratt says it's twenty-four weeks old and approximately 520 grams. Abby tells him that 500 grams is the hospital's liability threshold, so basically, policy states that they deliver the baby. I'm not sure why it would be, though, if the mom were to sign a paper stating that she wasn't prepared to invest the money in keeping the preemie alive. I guess it's a hybrid of hospital red tape and a tangent of the thorny "when is it murder" issue that's inherent in abortion arguments. Luka objects to spending half a million bucks saving one preemie and snatching the money from the coffers of the lead eradication program. "I've admitted three kids for [lead poisoning] this week," he complains. Romano breezes through long enough to support Pratt in this argument, because he's mercenary now as well as an asspole. Abby adds that the mother has no choice in this situation because it's not in her hands -- it's up to hospital policy. "Aren't you on a surgical rotation?" sneers Romano. "Yeah," Abby says tiredly. "Then ROTATE," Romano shouts. Abby toddles off, fighting a snicker. Luka brays about the baby's having an abnormal life, while Susan quietly throws up her hands and defers to hospital policy, leaving Pratt unsure as to which side to take. "First learn the rules, then learn to break them," Susan advises him. "What's in [Jenny's] best interests?"
Zack's mother listens worriedly as Luka expresses concerns that her son is a walking medicine cabinet. "He's had problems," says Mrs. Zack. "They told me it was for his own good." Apparently, she had a drug problem, so Zack ran a bit wild. "He got into fights," says Mrs. Zack. "It was self-defense," Zack counters. "He stole a car," Mrs. Zack adds. "One time," Zack protests. Mrs. Zack says that she was deemed an unfit mother and Zack got taken away. She doesn't have custody. Luka digests all this impassively, but you can tell he's pretty sure Zack is royally hosed.
Susan asks Sam if Bob's been over, but he hasn't, so Susan groans and grabs the phone to make some calls. Neela stops by to tell Abby that Patricia refused to donate Thomas's organs. "I've heard minority families seldom agree, anyway," she adds, apropos of nothing. Abby learns that Patricia is still sitting with the body, and chews on this for a second. Susan frets to Abby that Bob is late, and she's constantly worried that he's a tad suicidal. She hangs up the phone, frustrated.
Pratt's Neonatology consult comes down to meet with Jenny, but when Pratt looks to her bed, it's empty. She's done a runner. "Did you talk to her?" Pratt accuses Luka. He didn't, but Luka shrugs that switching hospitals to one with a different policy is her prerogative. Suddenly, a cab driver frantically hails them and wails that someone's bleeding to death in her taxi. Pratt continues to argue that just because Jenny didn't want to have the kid doesn't mean it was the best thing. "You're supposed to be teaching me, here!" Pratt shouts as they run outside. "I'm trying, but you're not listening," booms Luka.
Sure enough, the bleeder in the cab is a significantly weakened Jenny. She tried fleeing but her labor intensified. "Still in her best interests?" Pratt growls. "She wouldn't have left if you'd done what she asked," Luka counters. Jenny just sits there looking green and listing to one side, like she ate spoiled tuna salad.
In Trauma Green, Pratt, Luka, Neela, and Malik prepare to deliver the baby. "Too soon," murmurs a barely conscious Jenny. "One big push," Pratt says. No joke. She could sneeze and that thing would come flying out like a rocket. Pratt palms the fetus when it pops out, and carries it over to an incubator. "Don't save him," Jenny drools. Where is her husband in all this? Did she not call him to check whether he'd want the baby alive or dead? I kind of hate Jenny. "It's a boy," Pratt smiles, ignoring her. They show the baby -- Rex's little brother, Jethro The Repugnant Preemie -- and it very unfortunately reminds me of the South Park episode where Christopher Reeve sucks fetuses dry of their stem cells. I'm not certain that's the image this show wanted to project. Jenny still mutters instructions about letting the baby die. Sam shouts out that she's delivering the placenta, and throws a giant mound of red crap into a silver dish like it's fucking Thanksgiving and she's trying to keep the peace while elbow-deep in cranberry sauce. Pratt calls for them to prep for intubation, but Luka orders him not to do a damn thing until the baby's been weighed. "If it's less than five hundred [grams], we stop," he shouts. Pratt triumphantly shouts that the baby's six grams over the threshold, and they proceed to tube him. Luka looks disappointed. "She doesn't want this," he says. "I'm following the rules," Pratt says. "Doesn't make it right," Luka scoffs. Doesn't make it wrong, either. Jenny moans. Luka shakes his head vigorously and continues doing whatever he's doing to Jenny's vagina, which looks like either punching or kneading. We fade to black amazed that he can make even that look kind of sexy.
Patricia is sitting with Thomas in Trauma Yellow, staring at her husband's lifeless body and probably wishing he'd been left to die in Trauma Green, which casts better light that makes everyone look nicer. Abby sees Patricia sitting there and enters softly, offering to help in any way she can. She ignores her pager when it beeps, which seems like a small tactical mistake when you consider that she's a student, and Elizabeth is a formidable bitch when she wants to be. Faintly, we hear Luka and Pratt still sparring over whether Jethro The Fucking Creepy-Ass Baby-Type Thing should live or die. Patricia emptily asks what's happening over there, and Abby explains that they're fighting to save a preemie. "We just started trying to have kids," Patricia says with a soft smile. Abby pulls up a stool to her and broaches the organ-donor discussion. "He's been through enough," sobs Patricia. I've always found this argument funny, as if organ donation involves Thomas's being forced to sit up and remove his own innards while screaming in agony and filling out the tax paperwork so that it's all deductible. Patricia sniffles and wonders if Thomas has something that could help Jenny or Jethro. "I don't know. Maybe," Abby says. "But there are lots of others who would benefit." Patricia sadly remembers how her husband went out of his way to help other people, often to the point where people took advantage of him. "I would tell him, 'Nice guys finish last,'" she says. "He would always say, 'Guys who finish last are nice.'" So basically, she'd like him to be a front-running asshole. "He was so stupid," she sniffles affectionately. Then she pauses. "What would they do, if he was a donor?" she asks. Abby gently tells her that the recovery team would match his organs to people who need them. "He could help as many as fifty different people," she smiles. Patricia is affected. "Tom would like that," she allows. She wants Abby to go into detail, so Abby kindly begins explaining to her what might happen, beginning with his kidneys' being donated to two people facing a lifetime of dialysis from end-stage renal disease. We leave the scene here. It's a really nice moment for Abby that does bring out why she is good at the interpersonal relationships a nurse or even a private-practice doctor can build. Of course, it would have been interesting to hear Neela's approach to this so that we could contrast.
As Susan calls Bob, a scraggly kid we know as Sam's son wanders behind the front desk. His name is Alex. "Get any freaks in here today?" he asks, cheerfully leafing through a medical text. "Should you be looking at that?" Susan asks. Alex announces that he's going to become a doctor. "Dollars to donuts that kid's already dissecting neighborhood pets," Frank mutters. Jerry crouches down and asks if Alex wants to see the puppy, but Alex wants to see the morgue. "Your mom says we aren't allowed to let you into the morgue," Jerry says. I'm not sure why Sam's put them in the position of having to babysit her roaming kid. Hire a babysitter. Find him a friend. Invest in a leash, I don't know. Alex offers Jerry five bucks to sneak him into the morgue, and a skeeved Jerry backs away. "Does that kid ever give you the creeps?" he whispers. Frank figures Alex is a devil worshipper in the making. "Keep an eye on that puppy," he growls. See, I like Frank a lot better when he's like this -- gruff, but schmoopy for the puppy -- than when he's being a hideous bigot. Kind of like how I enjoy Romano when he's simply snarky and not a raging PMS case.
Susan is about to snap the phone in half, turn green, and swell out of her clothes, but before she can Hulk out, she spies Bob shuffling into triage. Relieved, she bursts through the doors and chastises him for being late. He apologizes in his usual halting manner and presents her with a bouquet of flowers. "You didn't have to do that," she smiles. "Well, there's a guy outside selling them on the street. It's no big deal," he shrugs. He then reaches into his bag and withdraws a book. "We're not finished reading it!" she protests, taking it. Bob's like, "I know, but sweet Jesus, just take it and stop the monotone." "I know how it ends" is what he actually says. Susan sends him off for his blood draw and smiles at his back. Chen oohs and aahs over the flowers in order to further the impression that she's a sentient being with normal reactions, but I'm not fooled by her human form. Susan explains that Bob's a Civil War buff who's losing his sight, and she's worried he wants to off himself. Frank grabs the book and, impressed, notes that it's a first edition. Chen suggests that Bob's pretty invested in Susan. "He has no one," Susan says. "He's going blind, he sacrificed everything for his career, and now he has nothing," she sighs. "No one should end up like that." She stares at Bob's pathetic and lonely figure as he gets blood drawn. God, she always gets the Ron Obvious stories. First it was the patented Boy Older Than His Years Dies Before His Time, and now it's Old Man With No One Loses His Faculties. I shudder to think what triteness season holds.
Luka's still working away on Jenny. He orders Pratt to take Jethro upstairs because Jenny is grossed out by her own baby, which is...well, kind of shitty. Sure, Jethro's not a looker, but she can blame that on herself and her husband. Genetics is a great scapegoat. Weaver pokes her head into the trauma room and figures that, since Luka's got his head up the business end of Jenny's birth canal, it's an apropos time to talk business. She tells Luka that Zack's caseworker is threatening legal action because Luka's refusing to give Zack drugs or release him to custody. Luka blames it on a test result that hasn't come in, but Weaver says it's in now, so Luka tries to appeal to her human side. "He can't go back there. That program is keeping him so drugged he can't think straight," Luka says. "He's a nice kid." Weaver chooses to take Zack's shrink's side instead: she's not happy that her ER doctor refused the treatment that a shrink with seniority prescribed, so they're going to go ahead and administer the Haldol. Luka freaks out and rails that policy is taking precedence over the kid's happiness. He rips off his gloves and leaves Jenny with Pratt while he chases Zack.
Pratt tries to engender Jenny's interest in Jethro The Barely Bigger Than The Maggots on Ernie's Arm Preemie, but he fails. Why? See aforementioned maggot comparison. Actually, it's kind of sad that she won't even let herself engage -- kind of like her love was conditional that the kid turn out normal. I don't get the impression that Jenny's afraid to love it in case it dies; she's acted more inconvenienced by all of this than worried about it. Pratt tells her all the great things they're doing for the baby and how comparatively well he's doing, but Jenny won't even turn her head.
Luka is too late: Zack's been zombified. He's being wheeled out of the hospital in a trance, and Luka leans down to look sadly into his eyes. "I'm sorry," Luka whispers. Zack registers very little, but as he's trucked out the front door, he looks back and shoots Luka one more doleful glare before disappearing for another week in Camp Lobotomy.
Madam Drug Rep chooses this moment to power-suit her way in front of Luka's face. He completely ignores her sales pitch until she offers to put together a drug package for him to take to the Congo. He turns around and fixes her with a stony smile. "You want me to take your overpriced antibiotic to Africa?" he says quietly. He quizzes her as to why there's hasn't been a new malaria drug in three decades, and she of course has no idea, because she's in sales and not development, and she's really just trying to pay for her Brite Smile treatments and Ann Taylor suits, and she's not entirely sure what "malaria" means, but she thinks it's a really pretty word and maybe she'd like to name her daughter after it. Luka goes apeshit and yells that there's no profit in treating poor people, so nobody has time to do it, and he has no interest in Terra's crappy swag. He starts throwing it all in the garbage can with extreme vigor. He attempts to kick her out, but Terra's not that bright, so she trots around after him trying to get him to change his mind. "If this is a bad time..." she begins. Luka goes outside and forcefully chucks her stuff in the garbage. It spills out onto the ground. "I'll just come back when you're not so busy," she calls out, obliviously. We fade to black on Luka's flaring nostrils and aggrieved eyes, and we wonder if this means it's going to be a full twenty-four hours before he gets her in the sack instead of the usual two.
Susan happily tells Bob that his blood work looks good. She then awkwardly pulls out the book and tells him he can't accept it. Bob sags a tiny bit and says, "You said you liked it." Susan clears her throat and says that it's not only worth a lot of money, but that it might be a little bit inappropriate. Bob sort of stops for a second, and one of his jowls twitches while the other listens patiently. I think they're having an angel-devil conversation. The angel wins, and Bob doesn't protest. "I didn't mean to hurt your feelings," Susan says sadly. Bob shrugs that he just wanted to show his appreciation. Bob does hangdog expressions better than anyone else in the world. He and Susan exchange all the expected, uncomfortable "It's no big deal," "Sorry," "It's fine," "No really" pleasantries that people do when they have no idea what else to say and they just want to fast-forward to an hour later when this is all behind them. Susan thanks him for the flowers, and as she watches him go, sighs, "I feel officially lousy."
Coop checks out Chen and butchers "Jing-Mei" in a friendly way as he's asking how to pronounce it. "Call me Deb," she says, rolling her eyes, but with affection. Coop asks her out on a date, but she says she's taking her parents to the airport. "I'll go with you," Coop offers. "We'll go out after you drop them off." Chen's sort of stunned, and frankly, so am I. That's pretty aggressive considering...well, considering it's Chen, and that there are cuddlier, more charming ice sculptures. Chen's amused and disbelieving. "It'll be good for some embarrassing childhood stories," he grins. Chen snorts that Coop won't have much luck with her parents, because they're walking stereotypes -- no warmth or humor, no thicker than paper, but just as apt to slice unsuspecting skin. "My dad has six toes," Coop says. "Just on one foot." What the hell? Does that mean he has eleven toes, or no toes on one foot? Oh, wait, I don't care. Trivia buffs, take note; otherwise, use this time to get another Diet Coke from the fridge.
Sam wanders up and finally expresses some passing interest in the location of her spawn. Jerry shrugs that he was around here earlier, and Sam has the audacity to order Jerry to find him. Sam, unless week's Most Shocking ER Event Ever In The History Of The Show is that you and Jerry had a hot fling and he's got fast-swimming little friends, then Alex is not Jerry's kid. So suck it up and figure out how to take care of him yourself.
Luka is across the street playing a videogame at Not Magoo's. Alex is hanging out behind him, getting ready for his first tango with Contrivance. "Use your fireball," he shouts. Wait a second. I should clarify that my Contrivance reference in no way connotes any intended bond between Alex and Luka's fireball. "Want me to show you the dragon punch?" Alex offers. Luka -- as a right-thinking non-pedophile -- declines. But then he dies in his videogame, and so might just think twice time before refusing the assistance of a nascent mullet.
Pratt tells a weakened Jenny that she lost a lot of blood, but that they're transfusing and she's going to recover nicely from Rex The Wonder Preemie's attempt at staking a claim on her womb by injecting it with his rotten little brother. Pratt gives her one last chance to look at Jethro, but she doesn't care. "Take him away," she says listlessly.
Elizabeth can't find Abby, and is annoyed to hear that she's hanging out on the fourth floor. I would be, too, if I knew what was on the fourth floor. Elizabeth finds Abby staring at Thomas's body. "I've been paging you," Lizzie begins. "I was with this patient," Abby apologizes. "You convinced his family to donate?" Elizabeth asks. Abby nodded. Elizabeth's appreciation for this registers, but then she gently cautions that Abby won't have the luxury of spending that much time with her patients. "You missed out on an interesting volvumus repair," Elizabeth says. I have a sneaking suspicion that she's overselling that one. The look on Abby's face indicates that a bowel resection would be more captivating. "I felt like his wife needed me," Abby offers lamely. "You already do this well, Abby," Elizabeth says. "Sometimes being a doctor is about distancing yourself from your patient." She exits to avoid an anvil that's dropping through the fourth floor on its way down to the ER, where it will land on the front desk and explode in a mess of whipped cream that spells, "Are you listening, Susan?" And then, of course, Coop will offer to smear the whipped cream in ungodly places on Chen's body, and the whole place will get sucked into the seventh circle of hell. Elizabeth ducks back in to let Abby know she doesn't have to stay any longer, but Abby opts to remain with Thomas.
Romano complains about Twopper. Except that he likes dogs, so whatever. "What is this?" he asks. "A Labrador," Lester says. "Wrong answer," Romano snarls. "Some sort of spaniel, a terrier?" Lester misunderstands. I admit that got a laugh out of me. Romano demands to know whose it is, and Susan claims it with a giggle and a cuddle. "She's a Seeing-Eye Dog, aren't you?" she coos. "How could you hate a face this cute?" She cuddles Twopper right out of the ER.
Sam bothers Jerry about whether he's located her offspring. He hasn't, because it's completely not his problem unless Sam's paying him several bucks an hour. Frank reveals that Alex is at Not Magoo's.
When Sam gets to Not Magoo's, she discovers Alex and Luka playing the videogame energetically. "What the hell are you doing?" Sam demands. Luka whirls. "My shift ended an hour ago," he sputters. "I'm not talking to you," she spits. Hee. She scolds Alex for wandering off. And yes, he's old enough to know better, but yes, you should spring for a babysitter, dumb-ass. Sam scolds him for not taking his shot; she notices a tub of frozen yogurt and gapes that Alex polished off the entire thing. "Where'd you get the money?" she asks. "He bought it for me," Alex says. Sam's irate, cursing Luka for not noticing that Alex is acting strange and associating it with diabetes and hyperglycemia. "I thought he was a street kid. I didn't know he was your patient," Luka apologizes. "He's my son," Sam sneers. Oh, shut up, harpy. Yeah, maybe Luka should have noticed, but dude, HE IS YOUR CHILD. Take better care of him. Make sure he takes his shots yourself. I have no patience for her blaming Luka, who was just buying ice cream and a videogame for a kid he thought was homeless.
Susan arrives at Bob's door with Twopper. "Sorry to bother you," she lies. "Are you stalking me?" Bob correctly guesses.
Jenny is up in the NICU staring at her baby. Pratt delivers the good news that his heart and lungs look great. "He's fighting," Jenny says hollowly. Pratt offers to escort her back downstairs, but she refuses. "I want to stay here a little while," she says. "He shouldn't have to die alone." Pratt's face falls. I can't tell if she's just being a complete pessimist, or she's asking them to pull the plug, but either way, Pratt's horrified, and I find it kind of annoying that Jenny can't muster up any love for her child even after seeing it. Makes me want her to go the hell away.
Susan and Bob take a stroll with Twopper, whom Susan's decided to give to Bob. I'm not sure when Twopper became a Seeing-Eye Dog, though, seeing as he'd need special training and some certification, but hey, maybe Susan's inappropriate involvement with Bob will graduate to having a price tag. This whole scene is incredibly boring but for the puppy being cuddly and cute and perfect. Susan offers a little personal information: she repeats her joke about her father being a Barcolounger test pilot, and drops the nugget that her mother's dead, which is a weird choice given that she's apparently a familiar character to longtime viewers. This show sucks for not trusting that its fans remember things, although come to think of it, TPTB are pretty much praying at this point that no one remembers the good old days. Anyway, apparently whoever gets the puppy gets to tell boring personal stories, because once Bob takes it, he starts in on his history. He grew up on a farm in Gary. He has an estranged daughter named Karen who won't speak to him because he coped badly with his wife's long and ultimately fatal battle with cancer. The whole time he's yammering, I am focused only on sweet little Twopper, who's falling asleep in Bob's arms. Actually, that's not strictly true: in all his close-ups, you can see the little scamp's head looking around happily, but in the two-shot of him with Susan, Twopper's been lulled into a cuddly and warm-looking sleep. It's the best thing this show's put on our TV screens in a long time, and I'm not even really a pet person.
Sam tests Alex's blood-sugar level and again shoots Luka all kinds of accusatory looks. "I didn't know he had diabetes," Luka defends himself. Sam accuses Luka of being creepy because he bought a kid candy and videogames, and Luka does the greatest thing: He just starts walking away in the middle of her sentence, because he knows she's so full of shit that she's spitting enough fertilizer to keep the White House Rose Garden healthy. Like, Luka obviously had no lecherous intentions. Whatever, Sam. She who leaves her child to run around with no supervision and makes him take his own shots and then blames other people when he (a) disappears, and (b) acts irresponsibly, really shouldn't throw stones at hot Croatian doctors.
Neela asks Luka's advice about a patient, and he tries to blow her off until he realizes that she's ordered a test. This piques his distaste, and he makes her flip over the chart to look at a price list of every procedure she's called for on this case. The total bill is almost $5000, and Neela looks appropriately startled by the total. Luka scolds her that she could've done a $15 test, an exam, and written a $2 prescription. "This is why we can't provide health care for everyone," he froths. I know he has some good points, but I really wish he'd get off the soapbox. He's tall enough as it is.
Pratt comes over in search of his Neurology patient -- the one who was waiting on a consult for a possible subarachnoid. Neela reveals that Luka discharged her four hours ago. Pratt is furious. Luka says she'd been waiting all day for help, and so he did a quick and easy spinal tap after a careful exam. "She was my patient," Pratt seethes. "This is how I'm supposed to learn? Your way, or you take it away from me?" Luka airily says that he's trying to teach Pratt that he practices medicine inefficiently. This so has to be leading up to some kind of malpractice bullshit, doesn't it? I have no interest in that being the outcome. I feel like we've already been there recently enough with these people -- angel of death, poor leukemia boy, that Marfan's guy...there's a list. Move on, TPTB. I hope my instincts are off here.
Pratt sasses that letting babies die doesn't seem terribly efficient to him. (He prefers makin' 'em.) "You really think you saved that kid today?" Luka scoffs. "For what? He'll need twenty-four-hour nursing care. That's a lifetime of commitment. You going to be around to give it to him?" That whole issue...I don't know, I guess it makes sense to let the mother decide, but again, where do you draw the line? If not at 500 grams, then where? When does a mother get to decide she doesn't want her baby and wants it to die, versus when the hospital steps in? It feels a bit like a slippery slope to me. But the kid probably isn't destined for a very happy or long or full life, so who knows. I don't blame Pratt for obeying the rules, but he's being so imperious about it, you'd think he was the attending here. He needs to learn a little something about hierarchy. "I'm sorry I'm not in some mudhut doing amputations with a pocketknife," Pratt sneers. "We have the technology and the experience to give that kid a chance. What's the sense of having it if we can't use it?" Yeah, but Luka's not suggesting that they not use it -- only that they choose their moments, with everything from Jenny to the triage patients who don't necessarily need Pratt to order a CT to double-check a sinus-infection diagnosis. He's definitely test-happy. If you broke a fingernail, Pratt would demand an x-ray to make sure there weren't ripple effects that shattered any wee bones in your hand. Luka points out that with the money they spent saving Jenny's unwanted baby, they could have treated a ton of other kids. "I do everything I can for my patients -- that's how I practice medicine," Pratt says loftily. How about practicing modesty, then? "This is Chicago, not the damn Congo. Maybe you should just go back to Africa." Luka mutters, "Maybe you should go to Africa." Pratt takes umbrage at this remark; he can't believe Luka just threw that at him. Luka suggests that he should learn that doctors do more than simply order tests and call for consults to cover their asses. It has to be more intuitive than that. Pratt then does the very mature thing and scathingly refuses to present cases to Luka any more. Hey, Pratt? In the immortal words of Luka Kovac: "You're not that pretty. You're not that special." So shut up, because you don't get a choice in the matter, dickhead.
Abby quietly repairs the cuts in Thomas's ravaged cadaver. The attendant suggests that she can be quick about it and let the morgue bat cleanup, but she meticulously ties every knot and sews him up cleanly. We flash back to her telling Patricia about what good Thomas's organs can do, and fade to black on her explaining how his heart, pancreas, lungs, liver, corneas, skin, bones, and tissue could benefit babies with birth defects, children with unlikely ailments, and adults who need a new lease on life. We leave Abby as she ties up her final knot.