ᴄᴏᴅᴇ ʙʟᴜᴇ • ᴍ. ꜱʟᴏᴀɴ

𝟎𝟎𝟒. no man's land

"I've already eaten," Emily said with a smile.

"What'd you have?" Derek asked.

"None of your business."

"Let me guess. French toast? Or those blueberry muffins Christopher used to buy? Or Joanna made you eat healthy today? All fruit and fiber-y?"

"Fine, leftover apple pie. Curiosity satisfied?"

"Apple pie?" Derek asked. "You never had apple pie when I lived there."

"What can I say? Things change," Emily said with a small smile.

"Oh, come on, let's eat something together," Derek said. With a flirtatious smirk, he added. "I'm just an attending getting to know one of his residents."

"Except for the fact that you used to live with such resident," Emily added.

"There are still a lot more things to get to know."

"Fine," Emily gave in. "We can have coffee together."

"Breakfast," Derek corrected.

"Take the win, Shepherd," she said, turning around. Without even looking back, she added. "Don't be late for your cordotomy, and don't be late for dinner tonight." 

She could practically hear his smirk as she made her way out to the ER. Emily was on trauma today, which was a nice change from pediatrics. She loved peds, and she was considering specializing in it but seeing kids suffer all day long had its cost on Emily's mental health. It was nice for a change, looking after an adult.

"Where do you want me, Liz?" Emily asked the chief trauma nurse.

"Shepherd needs you in Trauma 1."

"Shepherd is in surgery," Emily replied.

"He got pulled before he could start," Liz said. "And take some interns with you. I think they are going to want to see this."

"Hm," Emily said looking through the E.R. "O'Malley, Karev, and Cervantes, come with me!"

The two interns rushed to meet her, as they walked over to Trauma 1. Emily had to stop herself from gasping when she saw Derek's patient. "Those look like-" she began.

"Nails," Derek finished. "Guess we are going to need to have a rain check on that breakfast."

"Coffee. And you think?" Emily scoffed. "Jo is going to kill us both for missing out on this."

To their shock, the patient cried out. "I can't see my hands." 

"Oh, my God! He's conscious," George O'Malley said.

"Breathe, George," Rosa snorted. "The last thing we need is you passing out."

"Use 4 mg of morphine. Titrate up to 10. I don't want him to move," Derek said. "He tripped and fell down a flight of stairs holding a nail gun."

"Sick," Alex Karev said, earning a glare from Emily. 

"Somehow he managed to miss a blood vessel. That's a minor miracle. The optic nerve's been affected. Numbness on his right side. What's our immediate concern?" Derek asked.

"Infection," Rosa answered quickly.

"Right. I wanna be pulling these nails out in the next half-hour. I need a CT," Derek said.

"CTs are down," Emily said.

"What?" Derek asked looking extremely pale for a second.

"They exchanged them out last night. Computer crashed. They said they will have them back up by 1:00," she explained.