The Doctor's Heart

The first loss

"Denny."

"Why?" She asked. "Why are you thinking about him, now?"

A rough snort that hurt her throat came out of Riza and she looked back through the window. "Are you a fake doctor, now? A part of psych?" Gods, it hurt to talk. Her arms still burned with exertion from her compressions. Her futile compressions. Riza glared at her hands that could still feel the heart they had held. Trying to coax a single beat from a dear man, so that he could try and live another day.

"I'm concerned about a good friend and former student." She answered, smoothly.

"We would come here after a difficult case hit home or some of our personal issues." Riza sniffed. "And watching the babies eased that." A violent hiccup rocked through her as she tried to quell and even her breathing. Why couldn't she stop?

"Riza, you never came here when I was here and you have been on a ship for months. Why now?"

"You know why!" Riza cried and flinched out of Alice's reaching grip. "Johnny was so similar to Denny. I know that they aren't the same but he had a innocence in him that I saw in Denny. Why couldn't I save him?"

"There was nothing you could've done to save him. You and Lucy did your best."

"Our best wasn't enough."

"Sometimes it never is."

Didn't she know it?

-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-

Riza honed her eyes in on the heart monitor. Why wasn't his heart beating on his own? "Damn it." She growled. "We need to put him back on bypass and see what went wrong."

"Riza."

"Lucy, we have to try. We have to exhaust all efforts."

"Okay."

-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-

Riza sucked in a breath at the approaching figure of Mark. The concern in his eyes nearly tore her down again. She stumbled to her feet to only fall into to Mark's arms in a boneless heap. "C'mon, Riza." He effortlessly plucked the woman up.

"Where?" She croaked.

"On call room, I'm not stupid." Mark muttered to Riza under his breath, ignoring Alice's confused calls. "You don't want to deal with anyone, right now and you certainly don't want your crew to see you like this."

Riza couldn't summon the will to retort but laid her head on Mark's shoulders, she was too emotionally drained to say or do anything else. "After Lucy is done giving Booth a report, she'll join us. Mira too."

-.-.-.-

Riza kept pressing down, allowing her gloved fingers to gently massage Johnny's still heart. "Why won't you do anything?" She growled. "He needs help, his heart won't beat on it's own yet, Lucy."

"Riza, you need to call it. It's over. His heart isn't pumping on his own."

"No."

"Riza, please."

Riza's soft golden eyes flickered to the deathly pale face of Johnny to Lucy's hardened ones. Slowly she stalled her moments to a dead stop, she knew the face of death over the years. The look on his face felt so surreal. A coldness gripped her as she turned her face to the clock. Was this real? It didn't feel real. Felt fake. A bad dream she couldn't escape. The nightmare that wouldn't end. An out of body experience that she couldn't flee. Why?

"Time of death is 0501."

But this wasn't a nightmare, this was a reality that she couldn't wake up from. Riza ripped off her mask and slammed out of the OR. She was trapped, she felt closed in by her surgical gown. She gasped for breath and freedom, pulling bloody gloves off and the gown off. Riza haphazardly shoved them in a biohazard waste bin. Her back hit the wall and she slid down to the cool linoleum floor. Her bottom lip quivered.

Slowly, she picked herself up and dragged herself to the ladies' restroom. Where she let herself fall apart on the tiled floor of a stall. After several minutes, Riza picked herself up and left. She knew where she needed to go.

-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-

Riza curled up on the bed in the on call room. She was sandwiched between Mira and Lucy. Mark was forced to sit at the wall side in the opposite direction due to his history. She had no idea how long it had been but she was grateful for the space to get it all out. It wasn't fair to leave Lucy to have her deliver the bad news to the crew. It should've been her to have that talk but she couldn't. This loss hit harder than most. Her first loss as the doctor of the Red Hair pirates. This had to be the last.

Riza sighed and buried her face in Lucy's shoulder. "Sorry, I don't know-."

"It's fine, Ri'." Lucy mumbled back.

A warm hand squeezed her ankle. Mark. Riza dried the silent tears in her eyes. "Is it time to go back into the world of the living?" Mira asked.

"No." Riza croaked with a hiccup.

A knock on the door startled Riza, she raised her head up to the door creaking open. Booth stared at the four surgeons with a furious shake of her head. "Out! All of you! You're all cooped up here when you have better things to do! Like saving lives for starters! Doing your job!" All four of them sprang up and scrambled for the door. Riza tripped over Mark and recovered to run into Mira. "Riza, visit a bathroom and then, get to your crew. Red Hair and his vice captain aren't believing the report nonsense, anymore. You are dismissed for the rest of the day."

Riza cleaned up her face as best she could in the bathroom, her eyes were still red, puffy and dry and she felt like crap, drained of all energy she managed to recoup the night prior. However, she didn't obey Booth and go to the crew instead she headed home to sleep in her own bed. After Johnny... The crew would only stay so long. Maybe two to three days more max. Riza wanted to sleep in her own bed before they took to sea. The crew could do without her for the rest of the day. Booth was wrong about that. They had to manage without her. Riza was only a doctor, not a shrink.

Riza left the hospital to cry and sleep in her own bed.

-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-

Redfern stood in the OR, staring down at Johnny. Or what used to be Johnny. She and Lucy closed him up. Lucy had left to talk to the chief and Riza. Redfern remained, staring at her patient. Johnny didn't deserve this, yet he still died. She was told how his odds were at the start. If she knew then why was she crying these awful, fat tears? Virginia stumbled out of the OR and into an empty on call room. Was this was how it felt to be a pirate and a doctor in training on a ship? Did she truly wish to partake in this awful, exciting life?

-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-