Forgive And Forget

S10E16

Previously on Exasperating Relationships: Luka was seeing Montreal resident Gillian, whom he met in the Congo; then he started sleeping with Sam, whose son found out, prompting her to standoffishly suggest that she and Luka keep it super-casual; Elizabeth is seeing Minivan and has a date with Dr. Lawson; and Carter told Abby she'd be a great doctor. Wait, what? A medical plot? What does that have to do with sex?

Some kicky, jazzy music starts up as we fade in on Elizabeth having dinner with Minivan. He sloshes some curry onto her plate, which she greets with a nauseated expression -- just the kind of behavior that behooves one on a date. He calls it something that sounds like "Duck Sundae," and I sincerely hope that's not what he's actually saying, because that bodes poorly for its flavor. Minivan sits down and starts asking Elizabeth some rapid-fire awkward small-talk questions about her parents and her first kiss, and she nervously fiddles with a napkin ring. "You're terrible at small talk," she smiles. She tells him where she's from (Sussex) and what her parents do (surgeon, mathematics professor). She then claims that her first kiss was in seventh grade, which is kind of a big vernacular mistake. As a girl who grew up in England, Elizabeth would never have said "seventh grade," because that's not their school system. She'd have said second form, or something of that sort, or cited her age at the time. I don't think the culture shock of moving to the U.S. was so dramatic, and the rejection so fierce, that she sat down one day and aligned all her schoolgirl memories with whatever commensurate grade level it would've been in America. Minivan -- apparently having been relieved of his mental faculties for the night -- promptly asks Elizabeth if her husband died of cancer. Going from First Kiss to First Widowing doesn't sound like the most efficient way to make an evening cozy, because although nothing of interest could've happened in between -- we're talking about The Mark Years, here -- making a woman weep for the unexpected death of the father of her child is generally not Highway 69 to Orgasm City.

Elizabeth drops the napkin ring and frowns sadly, unsure what to say. She drinks some water and asks Minivan about his divorce. Two can play at this game, I guess. He shrugs that the story around the PTA is that he's divorced, but that he was never actually married to his daughter's mother. Elizabeth picks up the napkin ring again and twiddles it between her fingers. I'm not sure what the significance of the napkin ring is, except that it's adorned with a leaf, which perhaps makes her think of autumn, also called "fall," which is something a man's pants can do when you rip them open with your teeth. Minivan shrugs that his girlfriend was only twenty and left when their daughter was a few months old. Wow. I thought Minivan bought his eponymous car for his child, but maybe he'd previously used it to cart around his infant girlfriend. Then there's some shenanigans about his thinking Elizabeth would love Indian food because she's British, and should he fix her something else; as he gets up to take her plate, she grabs him and plants one on him. As they break apart, we see that Ella and RoboElla are standing side by side staring at them, having grown bored with whatever game of dress-up they were playing. Why on Earth did the casting directors get two identical little girls? It's creepy. Everyone blinks. I like to think Elizabeth's thinking, "Shit. Which one's mine?"

In his bachelor pad, Luka hears a knock and shrugs on a shirt so that he can answer the door. What a pointless, senseless act of modesty. A woman is showering in his bathroom; we see her silhouette. Apparently it isn't Sam, because when Luka opens the door, Sam's smiling at him brightly. The noise of the shower spray conveniently fades out. Perhaps it's been turned off. I am glad that the show didn't have the woman appear over his shoulder, but since that more or less happens later, I'm not going to give any credit for it either. Sam prattles that she knows she should've called, but Alex went to the movies, and she hadn't seen him, and he's working nights, and maybe they should get dinner. Luka's visibly uneasy during this exchange, and it makes me wonder if Sam has some kind of special blinders that come in contact-lens form. He's shifting his weight, looking over his shoulder, resisting eye contact, and generally appearing as though he'd rather plunge through the ground than extend this conversation. "I can't," he finally says. "Yeah," Sam smiles immediately, nodding. "I guess, yeah, I should've called first. No big deal." Pretending she's totally blasé about it, she grins that she'll see him at work, and turns to leave. We see a rueful shadow pass over her face. Luka shuts the door, troubled, and turns to see a cheerful Gillian coming out of the bathroom, freshly scrubbed and ready to dirty up again. "Is the food here?" she asks. He shakes his head. "Too bad. I'm starving," she says, kissing him warmly. Luka stares hollowly after her, conflicted, and we smash to the credits wishing we should be so lucky as to skinny-dip in a flute filled with the champagne from a bottle labeled "Luka's problem."

We enter County General in the middle of a fracas involving Abby, a disgruntled raving lunatic, and Malarkey. Because whenever the fracas is in town, Malarkey's probably riding bareback right through it. "I told you, the VA burned my files!" shouts the lunatic. "My back's killing me and I can BARELY walk!" He stands up in fury to make his point, and Malarkey says with irritation, "Whoa, you're standing. Look, it's a miracle." He then walks away, uninterested and dismissive. Abby argues that Looney Tunes needs a psych consult, but Malarkey isn't interested. Psych's turned the patient down five times in three months, and Malarkey thinks this will complete the second hat trick. That's a lot of rejection for an insane person. Abby apparently feels like the sheer number of consults indicates that the guy might actually need to get admitted, but Malarkey doesn't think it'll happen and won't even try to fudge it through a different department. He's openly derisive, which irritates the psychopath, who decides that in the name of group therapy, he's going to stand up and share his innermost desires. "I'm going to FRAG his red-headed ass and then I'm going to piss all over his USELESS CORPSE!" rants the man. Aw. Somebody's been reading fan fiction. After unburdening his soul and fulfilling his job as the mouthpiece of the world television community, Fraggle flees. Abby gives chase, but Fraggle sprints out of the ER. "I'm going to make you cry!" he screams at Malarkey. I'm still just happy he used the word "frag," which is military slang for blowing a person away with an explosive device. I remember a guy in my high school whose senior yearbook page was just one giant photo of him with a machine gun and the quote, "FRAG 'EM ALL." No one ever knew if he was being facetious, but at least graduated without running a grenade up the flagpole. One hopes Malarkey's flagpole doesn't make it through so unscathed.

Sam enters as Fraggle's ranting out of there, cracks open Overused Movie Quotes and You: Adapting Well-Known Phrases To Truly Hilarious Effect, and mutters, "Nothing like the smell of crazy in the morning." She bumps into Luka. "Back on days?" she asks. He is. She is. Okay. Luka just sort of stares at her while she gets going for the day; he's clearly still marinating in the sauce of his own guilt, mixed with the lingering sweat from a romp in le sack with Gillian.

There's a bunch of boxes stacked up behind the front desk. Frank huffs and puffs that Weaver decided to box up all the residency applications from the past ten years, because she's tired of floor damage from the falling anvils and she figures the bed of cardboard will catch a few of them. Frank crabs that he called to have them picked up. "Frank..." Luka hints. "And it would be my privilege to call again," Frank rasps, stacking more boxes. His face is bright purple. It looks like one of the California raisins from the Sunmaid commercials.

Neela brings a patient up to the front desk and asks Chen to take a look at her. The woman is holding her face in pain; apparently she had a fight with her girlfriend and her lip got split. "Lesbian catfight! Someone grab a video camera," Frank giggles. Neela looks irritated; the woman is carted away and Chen tells Neela that she'll teach her how to suture it. Frank leans in and whispers, "Should I call social work to get a BBL support group?" he asks. Neela blinks. "Big Black Lesbian," Frank translates. Neela glares at him, and then snaps and delivers the speech they've been building to ever since they made Frank a sick fucking pig. "You're a horrible man," she rants. "Do you think it's pleasant being greeted every day with a fusillade of homophobic, xenophobic rantings from a bigot? From now on I expect nothing from you except silence. Blissful silence." Frank blinks, and then leans back and watches Neela walk away. "Wow," he says to Chen. "Must be somebody's time of the month." He's totally undisturbed -- almost content. What with his total hosebeast boorishness, in which he marinates like an Easter ham, Frank apparently lives the cliché, "Ignorance is bliss."

Carter tracks down Luka and says that "Zhillian" left him a message, like he's Alex Trebek and she's a clue in Double Jeopardy category. He says "Zhillian" wants to get together with both of them later, and he appears to be amused and sort of knowing here, as if the chosen sheath for Luka's crotch sword is any of his concern. Sam trots up to get their co-signatures on a consent form for treating a thirteen-year-old patient. "We can...talk later," Carter says stupidly. Luka nods. Sam's instantly clued in to the fact that something was transpiring, not because she's suddenly intuitive, but because they're about as subtle as Gillian wearing nothing but bells and dancing on a giant bed of nails while singing the Canadian national anthem. Sam wants Carter to come take the kid's case, but he has to go, so Luka takes it. Sam explains to a spacey Luka that the kid's got right-side testicular pain, no nausea, no trauma, and he's not on any meds. "Any nausea?" Luka asks. Sam pauses. "No," she duhs. "I said that." Luka looks blank. I think he's just experiencing vomit comet withdrawal. This is unprecedented restraint, although they probably just ran out of oatmeal and ketchup.

The kid's name is Ryan, and he's both extremely well-mannered and grabbing desperately at his pained crotch. Luka prepares to examine him, and Ryan shoots an uncomfortable look in Sam's direction, so Luka makes up an excuse to get her out of the room. "Don't worry, Ryan," Sam beams. "Dr. Kovac is the best." Right indeed, considering we're talking about a crotch case. Sam exits through the curtain but leaves it open, and Luka makes no move to close it even though he's about to go dumpster diving through this kid's junk. "She's really hot," Ryan purrs. Ew. Of course, we get Luka's reaction, which is...nothing. He's the master of the non-reaction.

A man comes in with a fever and a preexisting brain injury that prevents him from talking or moving, or really communicating at all. His daughter Dahlia says he pulled out his line, which was in there to pump medicine into his body. In Trauma Green, they diagnose Vegetable Guy as septic and see that there's blood and lots of nasty funk around his tube. Carter asks Dahlia if her father signed any kind of DNR to prevent their using heroic measures to save his life. The man can't move or talk, Carter. What do you think? Do you think? "No, you have to help him," Dahlia blubbers.

Luka is doing what I think is an ultrasound on Ryan's groin. "Can you see through clothes with this?" Ryan asks, interested. "Nope," Luka replies. "Doesn't work. Already tried." Heh. Sam enters, and Ryan modestly yanks up his sheet. He seems to be feeling better. Luka wants to wait for the urine-test results before they do anything; Sam thinks that, to be safe, they should page Urology anyway, because it would be sad if Ryan lost a testicle. They bicker about this, Luka getting appropriately testy considering what part of the body is at the center of the argument. "Are you mad at me?" Sam gapes. "For coming over last night?" Luka shrugs that it was fine that she came over, and Sam blurts out that when she spoke to him about slowing down, she didn't mean that they shouldn't see each other at all. Look, Sam -- either ice the cake and eat it, or don't make one at all. You can't just put on the frosting and then leave it out on the counter. Doesn't work. "I didn't mean to hurt your feelings," she says. "You want things to be casual," Luka says flatly. Sam shrugs awkwardly and mumbles that if it's between no sex with Luka and committed sex with Luka that involves strings and attachments and whatever utensils might be included therein, she'd choose the latter. That's a very appetizing deal: "I don't really want you that much, but I miss the sex, so I guess I can put up with you." Luka's still staring at her, but you can sense the "Fuuuuuuck" feeling building in his throat, because he's already rebound-banging Gillian. Sam's called away before they can take this any further, but Luka chases after her and gingerly suggests that they should page Urology like she said, because nothing says "relationship subtext" quite like the almighty kidney and all its waste-making glories. "You think?" Sam beams happily. "Better to be safe," he concedes quietly. She smiles wide and trots off, throwing an extra grin over her shoulder.

As an irrelevant trauma of convenience comes in and unites Abby with some paramedics, she learns from them that a man has robbed the National Guard armory and stolen a tank. Abby pales, because the odor wafting through the room is the telltale stink of Sweeps Week desperation and the corresponding sweat that bursts forth from the pores of the typewriter monkeys. "A tank tank?" she gapes. "Yeah, George Patton, big turret, the whole deal," the paramedic nods. Abby bolts out of the trauma room.

Malarkey is cooing at Chuny, "You have beautiful skin." He might be high. So might she, actually, because she's tolerating this. Abby puts a chokehold of death on Malarkey's neck and drags him over to the television set, where everyone's crowded around watching the news. "That's gigantic," says a woman. Wait, I need a judge's ruling: can we say that on TV now that we're at the mercy of the FCC and its prudish reign of tyranny? Or do we have to say instead, "That object that is in no way associated with anything unsavory or anatomical is gigantic"? Frank gushes that the tank is sixty sexified tons of firepower. The tank is cruising down a street. Lester watches, rapt. "Don't hit the newsstand!" he breathes, horrified. But the tank driver has clearly read the Chicago Sun-Times and doesn't like the cut of that Roger Ebert's jib, so he motors right through the newsstand and flattens it. That'll teach Ebert to say that Billy Crystal should always get to host the Oscars™. Abby forces Malarkey to watch as the newscaster conveniently reveals that the driver is indeed none other than Fraggle, crusading loon and defender of the American viewer. Malarkey, faced with potential doom and a very stunning consequence of all his shortcomings, eloquently unleashes his deepest emotions: "Oh, crap." A TANK, people? I don't even know what to say. ["When I told Glark -- who hasn't watched this show in several years -- what happened in this episode, he just plain didn't believe me. As though I could MAKE UP A TANK." -- Wing Chun] The show is symbolically tanking before our eyes, making the least subtle statement about its quality that I've ever seen -- and this from a show that has a long and proud history of storylines that dole out head injuries to its faithful fans.

Frank hopes the tank isn't armed. Chen says that the National Guard claims it isn't, which makes this officially the dumbest sweeps stunt ever -- well, okay, like that crown hadn't already been spit-shined and placed atop Chulack's noggin. But come on: who gets a tank and then doesn't make it burp lethal flame? Frank claims you can't trust the people who let Fraggle gank the tank in the first place, but for me, all potential suspense has already gone the way of this show's dramatic subtlety. Malarkey pales. "He's headed here," he sweats. "He said he was going to get a tank and blow my ass up." No, he didn't. He said he was going to frag you and then piss on your brain. But as long as the end result is the same, I won't quibble about the details. We snap to black on this act-out thinking it's kind of bizarre and abrupt, considering they've already more or less removed the suspense of whether County General is going to go up in a giant fireball, and all that's left to wonder is if Malarkey will end up dying by suffocation once he's buried himself in a pile of his own cowardly and spontaneously ejected human waste.

Elizabeth is treating Veggie in the trauma room. His vitals are all over the place. Sam tries to kick Dahlia out, but because she's a glutton for punishment or something, she decides to stay and watch Elizabeth do whatever she's doing to Veggie's body tube. They call it a "pick line," and it comes out of his abdomen. Dr. Lawson -- he of the sweet accent and surprisingly receding hairline -- enters and is taken aback by Elizabeth's presence. "I'm here to replace his pick line. I put it in three months ago," he says, surprised. Elizabeth sing-songs that it's sweet of him to have stopped by, but that she's performed "a lovely cutdown instead." She sails out of there. Lawson follows, asking her not to poach his cases. Seems the doctor can dish it, but when he's asked to turn his own head and cough, he chokes. "When his cutdown gets infected, call me," Lawson snipes. "I washed my hands," she replies. I should hope so, considering she had an Angel of Death problem two seasons ago. Unless she's forgotten about it, which wouldn't entirely be her fault, since everyone else associated with ER let it slip their minds. "Still on for dinner tonight?" asks Lawson. Elizabeth gapes at him. "Find a sitter?" he presses. "Yes," she sputters. "Great. I'll call you about 7," he breezes, leaving. Elizabeth's mouth is swinging open. Sam comes out to talk to her about Veggie, but Elizabeth is still in total disbelief. "How do they do that?" she says suspiciously. "Men! They argue one minute and chat about dinner the ." Perhaps if she learned to say no to the hot but arrogant ones, she'd save herself some vexation.

Sam finds Chen and frets that Dahlia doesn't understand the extent of her father's condition. Dahlia, standing over her father's body, looks glum. "He's got a chance," Chen says. "A chance at what? A vegetative state for the rest of his life?" Sam snorts. Chen defers to Dahlia's wishes, and leaves an unconvinced Sam to stare at the wall.

Someone -- possibly Frank -- is playing a war game on the computer at the front desk. From that, we pan up to Carter and Pratt watching the news. Frank's fetishizing the tank, having gone to RollingDeath.com and looked up all the specs on the thing and what weaponry it might have. Apparently, there are uranium-tipped shells. "If he starts shooting, you grab your nads," Frank grins. Oh, how sweet would it be if Pratt and Malarkey lost their genitals in a nuclear accident? I know Pratt hasn't done anything today, but generally speaking, it's good to imagine them dropping off and leaving him friendless. Weaver enters, bellowing as usual. She's tailed by a detective, who's acting like they have this situation totally under control through the use of roadblocks. They want to force Fraggle to run out of gas. Malarkey's disgusted at this plan. "They're also getting a helicopter with a gigantic magnet," Abby says. "Really?" Malarkey asks, hope springing eternal in his eyes. I'll say this for Malarkey: Scott Grimes has got great comic timing. It's not his fault the writers have turned his face into a stirring visual synonym for "dillwad." Everyone around Malarkey pretty much stops what he or she is doing to gape at his gullibility. He rolls his eyes and looks panicked again. Abby tells the detective that Fraggle's mad because they couldn't help him. "Nothing was wrong with him," protests Malarkey. "You keep telling me to dispo patients faster," he then complains to Carter, who shrugs and insists that he wasn't alleging that Malarkey even did anything wrong.

Suddenly, Tankenstein busts through the road block -- which consisted of, like, two cars, which to a monster of machinery are little more than speed bumps. It's like trying to dam the Nile with two bricks. The detective blanches and flees. "He's coming for us," Malarkey breathes. "Not us, pal," Abby snots. "You." Malarkey looks like he'd be firing up the vomit comet right now if it hadn't taken an ironic sick day.

Sam is with Ryan, who apparently builds models sometimes but hasn't ever seen a real M60 tank. "My son makes models," Sam says. "He likes to blow them up. With firecrackers." Ryan nods matter-of-factly, as if to say, "Yes. As one would." Luka enters and reveals that Ryan's caught himself a nice nagging case of chlamydia. "I hook up sometimes...[with] girls in my class, like after school," he shrugs. "More than one?" Sam asks, stunned. "You're thirteen!" You can just see the wheels turning in her head: "Can I safely neuter my son until he's twenty-five?" But no worries, Sam. It's only a matter of time before Alex tries that on himself. Luka tells Ryan that a dose of antibiotics will fix it. "Cool," Ryan nods. Luka snaps that Ryan's got to tell the girls to get treated, clearly impatient with the whole situation and the casual attitude about sex, but unclear as to how to go about suturing the kid's wang to his leg. As they walk off, Sam mutters, "Is this what I have to look forward to?"

Frank struggles down the hall with a bunch of boxes, having resorted to moving them himself. Suddenly, Gillian arrives and kisses Luka in greeting. She had to drop off some things. "Traffic is awful," she says. "Someone stole a tank," Luka shrugs. God, even he's bored by this nonsense. "I know, I heard. Americans and their big cars," she jokes. She invites him out for a coffee, but Luka makes an excuse for why he can't, so she leans up and kisses him and sexily murmurs that she wants to go dancing that night. Luka's not into the kiss at all, which Gillian tries to hold tenderly. She doesn't notice his reluctance, instead skipping off merrily -- and revealing Sam, who had walked up and witnessed the entire thing. She crosses her arms angrily. "Who was that?" she spits. Luka gives the greatest answer: "Uh...she's Gillian." Like she's this entity that speaks for herself, the Cher of the Congo-Chicago circuit. Or perhaps he thinks she defies definition because there are no words that cover it, although I think people in the forum came up with some choice options, most of which are creative synonyms for "ho."

A father and son are brought in; their truck got hit by Fraggle's chariot of doom. Sam, fuming, follows them all into the trauma rooms to help -- which, in this case, means "make it about her," as if she hasn't gotten enough screen time since she aggressively barged onto ours. The father is screaming for his child while Chuny speaks reassuring Spanish to him; in Trauma Yellow, the terrified little boy is wailing for his father. Abby starts to order a bunch of stuff for the trauma. "Abby," Carter begins. "We're okay with..." and I miss the rest, because there's commotion, and this doesn't seem to go anywhere. I guess Abby was jumping the gun on running the trauma, but no one seems mad. Weird moment.

Neela runs out and asks Frank to locate Maria Rojas, the wife/mother. "Do you have the area code for Guadalajara?" Frank bigots. Wait -- I thought it was pride, not snide, that comes before a fall. Frank grabs the phone, pulls it into the drug lock-up for some quiet, and begins to make the call. Sudden chest pains derail him, though, and he collapses to the floor. The ensuing crater that opens up sucks the entire hospital into the seventh circle of hell, where it will languish below my cushy table in Ring Three so that I can look down upon it and its inanities until the end of time.

As they work on the little boy, Oscar, Luka prattles to Sam that Gillian is just a visitor he knew in Africa. Oscar screams, apparently unwilling to cede any of their attention, what with his litany of potentially mortal injuries. How selfish of him. Pratt makes a crack about sending Luka and Sam to see that mustachioed blowhard Oprah unleashed upon us and who's force-feeding us cornfed wisdom that's the 100%-authentic product of a room full of writers, but I don't acknowledge that said schmuck exists, so I'm ignoring the remark. The fact that it came from Pratt is just a bonus bitchy pleasure. Luka asks for a suture kit, so Sam does the mature thing and hurls one at him from across the room. If the writers are trying to make us like her, this is the wrong step to take. For one thing, it could have hit him in his perfect face, and that would have been all-out war, because although my love for Luka is pure, it's also superficial. Sam's a petulant little child here, obnoxious and unsympathetic and totally in the wrong. I don't understand why it's so hard for people to be the bigger person. I know this is TV, but it's infuriating, because it's not good TV. Finally, Sam pulls her head of her selfish stupid ass and gets to work on Oscar. He's thrashing too hard to take the injection of pain medicine; if he doesn't take it, they're going to have to tube him without it. Sam gets the epiphany to throw open the trauma-room doors, thus letting Oscar turn his head and see his father, who can do likewise. Oscar calms right down, the anesthetic goes in, and therefore so can the chest tube.

Neela heads to the phone to call Plastics to help with Oscar's facial laceration. There, she discovers Frank's unconscious body. He's foaming at the mouth, possibly choking on his own racist venom. "I need some help in here!" Neela screams. We fade to black not entirely sure why we're supposed to care, since everyone's worked overtime to make sure that Frank comes off as a completely unsympathetic bigot. Had he remained gruff but with a soul, this might've meant something.

Pratt finds Neela. "What'd he do, choke on a donut?" he asks. They get a gurney. Carter leaps into the lock-up and helps them lift Frank, which takes a fourth person and a lot of lifting from the legs. "He sucks down fried chicken for thirty years, and now we've gotta pay," cracks Pratt. Carter orders him to take Frank to the cath lab and stay there until he wakes up; Neela's tasked with figuring out if there's anyone to call. "The only thing I know about his miserable life is that you just saved it," Pratt shrugs.

Weaver's annoyed that the detective is changing his tune, having switched from a stirring rendition of "We Shall Overcome" to belting the theme from Cops. Malarkey is following them as they pedeconference, biting his nails in agony. "Dr. Weaver, if I'm endangering any lives, I'm willing to leave," he offers very sincerely. Such self-sacrifice! Such magnanimous behavior! Such bravery in the face of torment! Weaver nods that if he wants to go stand in the middle of Lakeshore Drive and continue this performance of The Passion of the Malarkey, he's more than welcome.

Luka is running around after Sam, who's decided that she has the right to freak out even though she kicked Luka to the curb -- and a bit rudely, too, I might add. I'm not sure why Luka's breaking a sweat trying to fix this. She must be great in the sack. "She has a boyfriend," he says of Gillian. That's perfect -- a real comment on his character -- that his explanation is not "She had already bought the ticket," or "It was before we'd met," but rather, "She has a boyfriend," which is like saying, "Look, she's sleeping with other people, too, so we might as well just make it a quadrangle." Luka points out that Sam was indeed the one who didn't want to be exclusive. "I said it four days ago," she spits, meaning that she thinks he was stringing her along with Gillian the whole time. Which isn't totally accurate, and also, shut up, Sam. "I forgot she was coming," Luka says tiredly. "I don't care," Sam whirls, staring daggers at him. "It's fine, Luka. You think I really care how many little French girls you're screwing?" Incidentally, that makes two in the last three years. Add Chuny into the mix, and Luka's got a real weakness for accents. "You've already nailed every nurse in the ER," Sam finishes furiously. As Malik pales, aware that his number just might be about to come up, Sam stomps off to go write a country song about the injustice of her life and her tragic lack of truck, banjo, and Budweiser. I get why Sam's upset, but she's acting like a hypocrite here and I hate it when female characters act bitchy and unlikable and still get the guys trotting after them like obedient little puppies who get off on being kicked. It's ugly.

Luka goes from one childish person to the : He now has to lecture Ryan's four conquests about the dangers of sex: "I know you're experimenting, but having sex at your age, and with people you don't have any feelings for...." Luka trails off. "You may regret it later," he finishes lamely. The kids stare at him, stone-faced. They don't much care for being beaten about the head with a crowbar wrapped in the day's script pages. Instead, they glare at Ryan, while Luka just looks heavenward, as if to beg the holy bishops above to stop making him the bad guy who has to put up with unreasonable wenches for the sake of pretending to learn obvious lessons.

Sam, still agitated, settles Veggie into his own room. Veggie wakes up and immediately tries to muster the strength to yank out his line. "Whoa," Sam halts him. "You need that line for your medication." She moves his hand back, and he whimpers and tries again. She realizes what he's attempting, and slowly, clearly asks him if he wants them to use heroic measures if his heart stops, or if they should stop trying to save him. "Blink twice if you think we should stop," she says carefully.

Dr. Kayson is fixing up Frank in the cath lab. That was quick. Frank comes to, and Pratt calmly explains that they're opening up the blockage in his heart to save him from having bypass surgery. "The cells are marching through single file," Kayson marvels. Well, Frank was a military man, so that's apt. Screens all around the table show what's going on in Frank's heart, which appears not to be made of coal after all. Kayson is irritated that Pratt's there, so he boots him, but Frank weakly begs Pratt not to leave. So Pratt gets a self-righteous look on his face and intones, "I think I'll stay a little while longer, if you don't mind, Dr. Kayson." The doc does mind, though, because he's worried assbaggery is contagious. "Tough," Pratt snorts. Frank sighs, distraught that his eight chins are rising up in angry rebellion, threatening to absorb the rest of his face.

Abby stands outside, frowning, letting the icy wind smack against her face and pursing her lips in a full-on duck-faced pout. If she's not careful, the wind will change and her face will freeze that way -- oh, wait, too late. Carter joins her and remarks on the spectacle before them: Snow plows and other vehicles are forming barricades near the hospital, praying this will be the day David and his slingshot take down the giant Goliath. But we've switched their regular Biblical enemy with a U.S. Army tank. Let's see if they notice. Abby distantly rattles off Fraggle's medical history -- drug and pill addictions, five psych consults with no admissions, back pain, paranoia, and delusions -- and Carter reassures her that none of those things would've meant that the sixth consult would be the charm. "I missed a drug-induced psychosis," Abby says flatly. I don't think she missed it so much as she was not empowered to do much about it given Malarkey's uncooperative nature and total lack of interest in the case. Carter tries to buck her up, but Abby insists that she isn't wallowing or beating herself up: "A guy came here for help and I let him go. That's just what happened." Yeah, my ass she isn't wallowing.

Neela tells Carter that Sam's looking for her, and just as they're turning to go inside, an older woman toting a Down's syndrome child calls out to them. "I'm looking for Francis Martin," she says. "He works here." The daughter adds, "My daddy answers the phone. He's in charge." Carter almost does a double-take when he realizes that they're talking about Frank, and that even Jabba the Hutt has a family. Again with the surprise, Carter. Guess what? Tanks are big! Are you shocked yet? Carter gently informs them that Frank had a heart attack, and tells a terrified Mrs. Frank that he's up in the cath lab. "Oh my God," their daughter says. Mrs. Frank touches her face lovingly and then listens as Carter defines what an angioplasty is. He has Neela take them upstairs, then sticks around so the camera can lovingly catch that stunned expression we've come to know and not love.

Chen yells at Veggie in an attempt to get him to wake up and focus on her. I'm sure that all the commotion is really making him anxious to oblige. Dahlia insists that her father blinks constantly and that it meant nothing; Sam thinks he blinked twice to tell her not to resuscitate him if his heart stops. "You guys need me?" Carter asks. "No," Chen retorts, annoyed. Sam admits that she asked Carter to come so that she could get an objective opinion, which pisses Chen off. But before she can lay into Sam, Veggie crashes and Chen orders epi. "It's not what he wants," Sam swears. Chen snaps at her to get the damn epi and be quick about it.

Frank opens his eyes. "I wonder what's for dinner," he muses. Beef. Dipped in lard, rolled in bacon, and fried in beer batter. Eat up, supremacist hog. Pratt grins that hunger is a good sign that he's going to be fine. Frank starts to reminisce about his time in the military, and how they'd always get a hot meal flown in after a firefight. "You know how to use a bazooka?" Pratt says, impressed. "Could use you outside right now." Frank can't believe that, so close to death, he'd be thinking about beef stew. Neither can I, frankly, because I'd rather gnaw on some shoe leather dipped in Pratt's bathwater. "You're not dying, Frank," Pratt insists. Frank smiles dreamily that half his army unit was black -- "cocky SOBs like [Pratt]" -- and that they were his best friends in the world. His voice is low and choked, possibly due to the fact that a compression of the larynx is an unfortunate byproduct of the battle for supremacy that's going on between his chin and his neck. He looks and sounds like Anakin Skywalker, after (spoiler alert!) his Vadar mask's been pulled off and he's dying on the floor of the Death Star. If he dies, they can burn him, and Ewoks will dance. Abby will fit right in with them -- she's about that tall. Anyway, from this we learn that many of Frank's nearest and dearest were African-Americans, which surprises Pratt, although it shouldn't, since the whole reason to give assholes medical problems (see: Romano, Robert) is to peel away some predictable layers -- the bigot has a pure heart! -- and confuse you into wondering if you ought to like him or her. If Hitler were in the ER, the writers would give him a baby with no arms and a sister with Alzheimer's, and invest all their residuals in Kleenex. Clueless. Frank is sad that his compadres from the war all died, and one of them took a bullet somewhere I refuse to acknowledge by any word other than "toe," and suffice to say I'm shaking my fist in the air and cursing the day someone in the entertainment industry decided that the toe was the new trendy spot to abuse. "Know what you are, buddy?" Frank rasps. Please say he's your son. "You are what those boys could've been," says Frank. A womanizer? An oil slick in a lab coat? A bulls-eye at which prejudiced desk clerks can aim their verbal darts? Pratt is touched, though, because that's what the writers wanted. Frank -- unable to maintain this level of pleasantness any longer -- passes out on the table. His pressure drops, his pulse skyrockets, and we learn he's bleeding into his chest.

Veggie's not doing so well, either. They're charging him and it isn't working, and Dahlia is shooting Sam the stink-toe for insisting that they should stop. "Shock him!" she whimpers. "Last time," Carter says softly. They do it, and Sam opens her mouth to say, "See, it didn't help," but smacks it shut when she sees he's got a normal rhythm. "His heart is beating," Carter tells Dahlia. "Don't stop," she spits. "His heart is beating," Carter repeats, sort of alarmed at her venom. But she's staring more at her father, and Carter's a tad wigged.

Neela rushes into the cath lab. "Lord, another one? Can't you people stay down in the ER?" Kayson sighs. Neela informs them that Frank's family is there. Pratt lectures Kayson on how to do his job, explaining that they need to drain the blood from around the heart, adding that Pratt can do it. Kayson's like, "As if, Cowboy." "I can have the stent in place in ninety seconds," Kayson insists. "He doesn't have ninety seconds," Pratt spits condescendingly. He certainly won't if you spend thirty of them gabbing about how much time he has before he's filed under "Screwed, Royally." Pratt insists that he can draw enough blood with a well-placed needle to save Frank, and from the little we've learned of him, I will admit that Pratt probably knows a thing or two about placing a needle. "Dr. Kayson," Neela has the gall to urge. Kayson looks like he wants to murder them both. But Pratt's allowed to do it, and he does it with a flourish. Frank is fine. "One lucky needle doesn't make you a cardiologist, Pratt," Kayson snots, wheeling Frank to the OR to fix up whatever perforated.

Abby, Lester, Malarkey, and a load of extras stare out the windows at the approaching tank. "They'll stop him. They will," Malarkey chants, unconvinced. Tankenstein turns toward the hospital as Malarkey looks likely to spontaneously urinate all through the hall. , Tankenstein unflinchingly plows over the line of cars parked along the side of the road. Because nobody wanted to donate their Mercedes sedans to the sweeps-week graveyard, it would seem everyone in Chicago drives clunkers on this particular day. Then our armored ratings monster gets stuck when it tries to turn, and rams an ambulance; for a brief period it looks as though we're going to get an elaborate multi-point turn like in Austin Powers. Rhythmic marching music strikes up as the snipers from the hospital roof take aim.

Tankenstein, as a monster, evidently lacks staying power. He's no match for the mighty snow plows, in large part because prop plows are much more expensive than prop Oldsmobiles, and so none of them is authorized for demolition. "Throw his ass in jail!" shouts Malarkey. "He needs an eval and a psych admission," Abby argues. "What kind of eval does he need? 'Have you ever stolen a tank?'" Malarkey squeals.

SWAT teams approach the tank and scale the, er, cockpit, or wherever it is that Fraggle's hiding himself. The cannon swings around but nothing happens. What the hell? He can figure out how to gank a tank, but he can't actually ram it through a building? Fraggle is the worst vengeful psychopath ever. The SWAT men open it up and something explodes, and it's not immediately clear whether someone shot Fraggle, threw a smoke bomb in there, or whether Fraggle had something at the ready to throw up at his enemy. Whatever happened, smoke is pouring out of the opening, and the SWAT guys promptly fire shots into the cockpit. "Oh my God!" Abby exclaims. Then, a pensive, "Oh my GOD." We fade to black wondering why she's surprised that the men with guns fired on the man with the gigantic cannon sticking out from his phat ride.

Abby runs to catch up with Fraggle's bleeding body, which suffered three bullet wounds to the chest, neck, and shoulder. He draws a ragged breath and murmurs, "I said I was coming back." That's reassuring. He may be a psycho, but he's an honest psycho. Abby screams for Malarkey to help them out.

In Trauma Yellow, Fraggle clings to life. They can't bag him because he's got too much blood around his mouth, so they're putting n a chest tube, and Carter wants Malarkey to do it. Abby's irritated with this, because she knows he's incompetent, but she's forgotten that she's still a med student and therefore doesn't get to dance the spotlight tango. "No. Carter, he's not doing it," Abby argues. "He's my patient!" Malarkey suddenly avers, like he's proud of it now that the guy's gushing blood. "Yeah, he was, and look what happened," Abby says, disgusted. Carter calmly looks up at her and insists that Malarkey be the one to put in the tube. Malarkey eagerly does it, for possibly the first time in his medical career. This had better not be a redemption arc for him. Doesn't this show get tired of beating people down and dragging them up again? Malarkey gets the tube in, and Carter compliments him. As they whisk Fraggle up to the OR, Malarkey is overcome with false competency and asks to scrub in for the operation. "No," Carter says simply, wheeling Fraggle away from harm. "He's going to be okay! We saved him!" says Malarkey. Abby shoots him a poisonous glare before flouncing out of the trauma room. I guess she's ticked that Fraggle was only worth his time when there was an obvious and easy problem to fix. Also, she knows he blows. And this is the end of Tankenstein's reign of terror, which was the most ridiculous and pointless stunt ever contrived -- and that includes anything involving a helicopter or inclement weather. The story was Malarkey's, but it became All About Abby, and not in a sympathetic way -- I don't know, it just did nothing for me. I wonder what war movie is filming at Warner Bros. I feel like TPTB got access to a free tank and were like, "We'd be crazy to turn this down!" So they ripped a story from the headlines -- from many, many years ago -- and they made it dull and laughable. Well done! Applause all around.

Sam regretfully tells Luka that one of Ryan's friends has chlamydia and is getting admitted for an ovarian abscess: "She could lose a tube." Luka gazes at her dolefully, and then asks if she'll have coffee with him. Sam looks tempted to say yes until she spies Gillian swanning into the ER behind him. "No thanks," she hisses, walking away. Gillian, no stupid water fowl she, notices this. "Hi," she says, bemused. "Are you ready?" Luka takes another look at Sam, who meets it angrily, and then turns away and leaves with the doomed Gillian. I can't believe we didn't even get a catfight. Gillian doesn't strike me as the type to so blithely let her fuckbunny run free.

Neela brings Mrs. Frank some coffee and sits with her, looking like she'd rather be anywhere else in the world. Mrs. Frank glances at her calm daughter, Janey, and smiles that Frank took the ER job because he wanted to put away more money for her. "All he ever thinks about is his Janey. I'm sure he talks about her all the time," she beams. Neela bites her lip. "Yes," she lies. This is so sad, because rather than making Frank sympathetic, it makes his wife look pathetic. "He loves it here," Mrs. Frank weeps. "Comes home with stories all the time." Neela carefully says that Frank makes the work day interesting. Mrs. Frank correctly identifies her -- first and last name -- and tells her that Frank's constantly extolling her intelligence and skill. Neela is a bit stunned and sputters her thanks. "Frank's always been a people person," Mrs. Frank adds. Now Neela's trying not to snort. This whole storyline leaves a bad taste in my mouth. Neela comes off looking a bit bitchy even though she's the victim of all Frank's slurs, and Mrs. Frank looks like a sad deluded old crone, all because the writers thought it would be funny to make one character a rampant bigot so that they could write a misguided redemption arc of some kind. I don't even know. It's just so badly done. I really, really don't get why they had to take it to the extreme with Frank. Troy Evans deserves better.

Dahlia sits with her father, who has suffered more brain damage and may never even open his much-disputed toelids again. Sam sits with her and quietly begins to discuss extended care. As is the wont of tertiary characters on this show, though, Dahlia would rather ramble and reveal her deepest secrets of love and hate. I think they pipe truth serum through the vents sometimes. "Do you think people get what they deserve?" she says, bitingly. She goes on to tell Sam her story: apparently, from fifth grade until his accident when she was seventeen, Veggie used to make sure Dahlia was home alone after school before coming home and ostensibly having sex with her. "I'd take a shower and wait in my room," she sobs. "He liked it when I left my hair wet." Her expression is fury tinged with a child's affection for her father. For once the show's being a bit subtle about her feelings, but I'm thinking that she wanted so desperately and bitterly for them to save him because she figured his prison of pain and physical disability was just the sentence he deserved for years of abuse.

Gillian giddily wants Luka to take her out dancing, but he's not going to, and she realizes it when she takes a look at his face. It's over. Sadly, she kisses him tenderly. "Are you in love with her?" she asks. Luka says nothing to her, implying that he is, or is at least hoping to be. Not sure when that happened -- possibly, it was when Sam was treating him like shit, or maybe when she was giving him mixed signals. Wait, no, it must have be when she was insulting him loudly in the middle of the ER. Such a foundation of love! It's amazing they're not married yet. "You know, I'm jealous," Gillian says, smiling through building tears. "I don't have any right to be, but...yeah." She pecks Luka again and bids him farewell. Luka watches her go, because all he's done with women in this episode is stand there and watch them walk here and there and everywhere, and why should he change now? It seems to be working. They all want him.

Frank regains consciousness. Pratt is there, explaining to him that they removed the blockage and that he's got a new lease on life. "No more nachos, no more perogis," he warns. Frank blinks. "I'm in hell, right?" he rasps. No shit. He doesn't even get Carrie Fisher in a metal bikini on a leash. "You killed me," Frank coughs. "You and your faithful Indian companion." Pratt sighs. Just then, Neela brings in Mrs. Frank and Janey, who bounds to her father and puts her head on his chest. "I wasn't scared, Daddy. I wasn't," Janey insists happily. Is eyes misting, Frank pats her. "That's my good girl," he says. "You're my brave girl." Neela and Pratt watch, and then actually have the gall to read Ron Obvious's words: "Hard to believe he was an officer, and a husband and a dad," she says. Pratt adds, "And a bigot." Great. Wrap that shit up and slap a bow on it, and there you have it: A neatly packaged storyline. So contrived, so unimaginative.

Elizabeth peeks in to check on Frank, and grins that Dr. Kayson told her Pratt and Neela are banned from the cath lab. "Nice work, you two," she says with a sly smile. Pratt and Neela like this.

As Sam and Alex walk home, Alex is prattling on and on about something that happens in Evil Dead 2, which I haven't seen, so I can't vouch for the accuracy of what he's saying. He tells Sam that she'll be scared by the flick, and then spies Luka at their front door. "Luka!" he shouts delightedly, inviting him up to watch the movie. "Mom got me McDonald's, but you could order pizza," he says eagerly. Since when did he get so chatty and gleeful? Last we saw, he was giving Sam and Luka the crafty cold shoulder and pretending it didn't affect him that they were having sex. Now suddenly he's trying to throw them together? Sam uncomfortably sends Alex upstairs to start the popcorn. On top of McDonald's? What's for dessert -- KFC?

Sam tiredly rubs her face. Luka blurts out that Gillian went to a hotel. "She was at your apartment last night, wasn't she, when I came by," Sam realizes. Luka nods. This squicks her out. She implies that Luka and Gillian were probably in each other's arms and in bed before she even left the building, which isn't true, but which Luka doesn't deny, either. He's not terribly good at defending himself. "So stupid," Sam shakes her head. "I really...Whatever." She bites back emotion and tries to shake it off, demanding that Luka say what he came there to say. "I screwed up. I just wanted to apologize," he says. "Okay," Sam says, walking inside. Devastated, Luka calls out to her, then gulps. "Tell Alex...just tell him I'm sorry I couldn't stay," he says with difficulty. Sam storms inside, takes the requisite three paces before she realizes she's an asshole with no brain, and rolls her eyes. Bolting back outside, she shouts a charming "Hey!" Luka turns around and resists my mother's tried-and-true "Hay is for horses" retort to people who use that rude holler. "These movies scare the crap out of me," Sam calls out, her voice faltering on the last few words. Luka looks at her for a few seconds, understands her meaning, and slowly crosses the street again to be with her. God, why do people write women this way? Sam was unfair to him, and yet Luka's still chasing, and all Sam has to do is this half-assed effort and he's chomping at the bit? Lord. Makes me annoyed to be female.