It was a night like any other. Asami was on duty in the ER for the night, rather than her regular shifts during daylight hours. And she was tired. She never really adjusted to the crazy hours of working in a hospital.
So Asami grabbed the coffee pot in the hospital break room and poured herself a cup. She was sitting down with a patient's chart and was about to start reviewing her notes on the surgery she would perform next week, when the door to the break room opened.
"Hey, you doin' ok tonight?" Her fellow surgeon and best friend, Opal Beifong, asked her. Opal was getting a coffee refill as well.
"Yeah. Just tired. You know these aren't my favorite shifts." Asami told her.
"I know, but everyone has to do them." Opal reminded her.
"And that's why I never complain about it."
"Uh huh. You just drag your feet, mutter under your breath, and roll your eyes a lot more than you do on your regular shifts."
"Fine. You caught me. But I do like helping, so I'll try harder to mask my disdain for the ER."
"Not like you have much of a social life outside of here." Opal teased.
"Hey! That's not true!" Asami stated.
Opal gave her a small punch on the arm and left her there. Asami sighed. Opal's joke stung because it was completely true.
She didn't mind the ER shifts, but she enjoyed her scheduled surgeries a lot more. Any neurosurgery patients that came through the door were likely to be tragic and messy. Car crashes, falls, aneurysms, blood clots, and the list went on. Her scheduled surgeries could definitely be tragic and messy as well, but she could usually plan them out. She could be prepared for possible outcomes. When she worked the ER, anything could happen and she had to rely on her instincts.
So, while there was a little downtime, she worked on one of her planned surgeries for the following week. She had already practiced in the skills lab to prepare, and she had performed this surgery plenty of times before anyway. Asami liked to plan everything out though. She could almost do the surgery blindfolded, not that she would. But she knew she could never be too prepared, so even though she had memorized all her notes, she reviewed them just the same.
Less than twenty minutes later, her pager went off. She grumbled to herself, but got up anyway. Asami went back to meet Opal at the ER bay doors as they waited for an ambulance to arrive.
The vehicle pulled up and as soon as the back doors opened, Asami saw what should have been a person, but looked more like a bruised and bloody person-like object. A leg was sticking out at an odd angle and for a moment she was shocked by what she was seeing.
"Female, late twenties or early thirties, blunt force trauma." The EMT started listing off. Asami snapped back into action at his voice. Opal and her were already at the patient's side and checking vitals, assessing the situation. "Broken legs, broken pelvis, at least a concussion, probably injuries to internal organs, broken ribs, and we suspect a punctured lung from one of the broken ribs."
"What in spirits happened?" Opal asked him.
"Dunno. Someone found her on the sidewalk like that."
"Was she hit by a car?" Asami asked.
"Doesn't look consistent with that type of injury. Looks more like a fall if you ask me, but like I said, she was just found like that."
"I'm surprised she's alive." Opal said.
"We were shocked when we found a pulse too. It must have been a pretty big fall. Coulda been a jumper. Good luck." The EMT said as he left the doctors to it.
