Is it worth it
Oct. 20th, 2005 12:04 am![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
anmani.livejournal.com posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
nickngregTitle: Morten, chapter 22
Pairing: Nick and Greg
Rating: R
Summary: Brass has some bad news
Genre: Angst
Disclaimer: They belong to the CBS and not me
Warning/Spoiler: Set after Grave Danger
Brass came marching down the hall with a more annoyed footfall than normal. He wondered who had been given Brass’ case.
“Is Nick with you?” He didn’t know Brass as well as the others did, but the pain in the man’s eyes was evident.
“Nope, he and Sara were the lucky winners of a sleazy bar complete with two DB’s”
“Louise’s mother has been attacked.” Brass stated and his world shattered like the lab had in the explosion.
“How…how is she?” He stuttered and gripped the older detective.
“Badly beaten, they’re taken her to Desert Palms.” Brass caught him as he knees gave in.
“She called in the attack herself, her ex did it.” His head or the hallway was spinning madly.
“Fuck!” He whispered in horror.
“I’ll take you there now Greg.” Brass led him out to the waiting police car and raced to Desert Palms with the siren howling and the lights flashing.
“Nick it’s Brass, Louise’s mother has been attacked by her ex. I’m taking Greg to Desert now.” Brass had called Nick to give him the bad news.
“Okay I’ll make sure they let you in.” Brass’ voice was drifting away as Vegas passed in blue flashes.
“I don’t fucking care! Find the bastard!” Brass barked into the radio pulling him back to the present moment. He tried to say something, but only a few incoherent words came out. He gripped the dashboard hard when Brass yanked the vehicle across two lanes.
“Every cop from here to Houston is looking for him.” Brass said in what he took to be a worried sympathetic voice.
Brass barked at the receptionist and any other staff within earshot until they were allowed into the room where Mette was. There were 5 people in various kinds of gowns milling around the prone form on the gurney. His mind tried to take in the scene before him, tried to hear the stats reported from the nurse to his left, tried to hear what the doctor in the safety goggles was saying, tried to hear what the woman with the stethoscope said and tried to see how severe her injuries were.
Somebody dressed him in a gown and put on gloves.
“Mr. Sanders?” The female voice was strong and clear, much like his grandmothers.
“Ye-yes what… how bad is it?” His voice was low and quivering.
“She has sustained several blows to her head and stomach.” His eyes locked on the round belly on the gurney.
“… to her, but she has gone into labor.” He shook his head in disbelief.
“It’s 8 weeks early, 8…” The doctor wearing the safety goggles shouted a string of orders and a few words seeped into his brain: Collapsed lung, CT and NICU.
“Mr. Sanders maybe you should step outside.” The strong female voice suggested but he was frozen in place.
“No, I have to be here. Have to be here for the baby.” He fought to get the words out.
“It’ll get bloody.” The strong female voice said.
The statement reached deep inside him and he turned to face her.
“I’m a CSI! Blood is part of the job description.” He spat the words out in disgust. The doctor with the safety goggles barked another series of orders and the woman dragged him to one side of the room. His mind listed all the possible side effects of being born 8 weeks premature that he had ever read about. It was not a pretty list and for each word out of the doctor’s mouth, his heart broke more than he ever had imagined possible.
Suddenly the strong female voice held up a small slimy fetus, he smiled to fight the gag reflex.
“It’s a small boy.” She handed the baby to a new person in the room.
“1850 grams and 42 centimeters…” Whatever else was said drowned on the way to his mind. He was simply to busy remembering survival and disability stats for prematurely born children with that weight. If he recalled correctly the baby had a good chance of normal life, provided intensive medical care was given right away.
“…name. Do you have a name for him Mr. Sanders?” The strong female voice obtained his attention and his disoriented brain grasped randomly for a name.
“William Nicholas Stokes Sanders.” He stammered. There was two people working with the fetus and despite everything happening in the room, the only thing he heard was that there was no crying. There was nothing to indicate that the baby was alive.
More orders and stats were shouted by the various people in the room. He knew what they meant, but his brain utterly refused to put them together, just like it ignored the blood on the floor and the doctor who had both his hands inside Mette.
“Follow Nurse Walters up to the NICU.” The strong female voice grabbed him by the elbow and sent him after the nurse leaving with the incubator holding his little boy.
He sensed nothing but the baby as he rushed after the nurse. Doctors and nurses told him a million things while they worked on the baby and he tried to remember it all. It would be important to remember it all. The baby’s life would depend on him remembering it all so he could provide the care needed for the baby. He listened and listened and eventually the baby was placed in a room with 3 other babies.
There was a chair next to the incubator and someone pushed him down into it. From there he could see the monitor that the baby had been hooked up to. There were several graphs and numbers on the monitor. He knew what each of them measured and he knew how much or how little fluctuation was acceptable for each value. How he had come to know it, was not something he could remember however.
Nick placed a strong arm across his shoulders, but he couldn’t make himself turn away from the monitor and the tiny baby.
“Sorry I couldn’t make it sooner baby.” Nick’s soft words drifted into his mind.
“It’s okay.” He whispered back not moving, since he was afraid to disturb the baby.
“William Nicholas Stokes Sanders.” Nick read the name loud from the nametag on his wrist.
“They demanded a name.” The heart rate increased by 5 and he held his breath until it slowed to its previous level.
“…it.” Nick’s words didn’t make it through to him.
“Keep your voice down, he reacts strongly to sounds.” He whispered the warning to Nick. The heart rate increased again, but only by 2.
“I said I don’t think we should call him that.” Nick whispered into his ear. He shrugged his shoulders and waited for the heart rate to return to normal.
“Morten William Sanders.” Nick held him tight and he shrugged his shoulders again.
“Mette was still in surgery when I arrived and if Brass hadn’t been here I wouldn’t have been let in to see our baby.” Nick planted a kiss to his cheek. All the numbers on the screen fluctuated when the baby moved his tiny arm.
“He’s so small.” He could hear that Nick was on the brink of crying. He gently placed his hand on the one resting on his shoulder.
“It would have been better if he had weighed just 200 grams more, less than half a pound.” His voice was calm quiet and detached.
“Have you called your parents?” He had no idea what to answer Nick, because he could only remember having thought about.
“Are you okay with the name?” He just nodded, not really caring about anything except the stats on the monitor.
“I’m just gonna go make some calls.” Nick pressed a kiss to his lips and only habit made him return the kiss. His eyes returned to the monitor as soon as Nick left. Suddenly an alarm went off and a myriad of people came into the room. It took him forever to realize that it was one of the other babies and then let out the breath that had been caught in his throat.
“Momma said….” The heart rate was increasing steadily and it was probably all the fuzz created by the alarm that caused it.
“…in tomorrow.” He blinked and looked at Nick for a brief moment before turning his eyes back to the monitor.
“… biggest manhunt in…” Words from Nick drifted in between the fluctuating heart rate.
“Papa Olaf …” All the people that had rushed in before left in small groups and the heart rate slowed to a more acceptable level.
A glass of juice was pressed into his hand and he drank it without paying any attention to the taste of it. Nick had left again and a tiny blond nurse had gone over the procedure for him to touch the baby. He had scrubbed his hands red and then disinfected them before gently cupping the baby’s head with his left hand since the right one had taken up shaking again. The small warm head sent shockwaves through his body, he felt with an unwanted clarity how soft and unfinished the scull still was.
The tiny blond nurse allowed him to help feed the baby via the tube down his throat; he was still too weak to suckle. After the baby had been fed the stats behaved out of sync and he pressed the alarm button. The tiny blond nurse came back with a doctor who had really bad acne on his face. The doctor explained in great detail how the baby would react to being fed and changed and touched and how the blanket should be tucked around him.
Had his heart not already been shattered in infinitely many pieces, the doctor’s words would certainly have done it.
“Pappa.” Louise reached up for him to lift her up and he wondered just how she came to be there. He picked her up making a mental note to scrub his hands before touching the baby again. A warm strong hand landed on his neck and he looked up at Nick, who radiated concern and worry.
“They’ll change the name on his papers real soon.” He vaguely recalled Nick talking about the name previously, but it didn’t matter.
“You have to disinfect your hands if you want to touch him and you can only hold your hand to his head. Being touched is very stressful for him.” They spoke in hushed voices like the other people in the room.
He had lost all notion of time, the only thing he knew was the stats on the monitor and the baby. For some weird reason he also knew that Mette was out of surgery and in the ICU and that the injuries to her body had been repaired, but the swelling in her brain was still something that the doctors worried about. He had no idea who had told him or when. Nick had disappeared with Louise and when he looked at his watch there was only an hour to shift began.
“Greg what are you doing here?” Grissom stared at him in disbelief when he met his boss halfway to the locker room.
“I work here.” There were times where he seriously thought that his boss had some mental disorder and a question like that could only cooperate to that.
“But aren’t you supposed to go on leave?” Grissom had his blue eyes wide apart in shock.
“Not until I can take him home. Unless they’re critical you can’t stay at the ward at nights, so I might as well work.” He felt strange having to explain something so simple to his boss.
He worked hard and focused all night and it was such a relief not to be in that way too warm hospital ward, where the only thing to break the silence were the breast pumps and alarms. For eight hours he didn’t have to worry about stats on a screen and tiny jerky moves in a incubator.
At one point during shift Nick dragged him off to the men’s room.
“You never told me if you like the name?” Nick held him by the shoulders and just looked into his eyes.
“The name?” He knew it should mean something, but he just couldn’t remember.
“Yeah… Morten William Sanders. I thought the other was a bit too much and this also carries his mother’s name.” He blinked and something in his brain nodded in recognition.
“Oh yeah that’s right, they asked me in the ER and I just said what came to mind first.” He could barely remember what name he had said. Nick took his wrist with the nametag and held it for him to read. William Nicholas Stokes Sanders.
“I love you Greg.” Nick lowered his voice and finished off with a kiss.
“I love you too.” He leaned into the kiss and Nick’s strong body.
“I don’t blame you for being so out of it today doll.” Nick cooed.
“He’s so small. It’ll be moths before he can fit any of the baby things that I’ve bought.” He melted into the hug and allowed a few tears to trickle down his cheeks.
“You know you really don’t have to work.” Nick spoke ever so softly.
“But I’d still have to leave at night, he’s not critical and nothing’s wrong with me.”
“Just let me know if you need a break, yeah?”
“I’ll be fine Nick. You take care of Louise and I’ll be there for him. I think I’m better with hospitals these days anyways.” He hated hospitals but Nick’s trauma still sat too deep for the Texan to spend all day there.
“If that’s what you want baby.” Nick kissed him and for a few deep passionate kisses everything was fine.
After shift they went home and he took a quick shower before leaving for the hospital again. The baby was sleeping when he arrived and all the stats were fine. He disinfected his hands and held his hand against the tiny head. It was still soft and warm and his touch provoked an increase in the heart rate. Nick came by with Louise and stayed for some hours he guessed. Jillian and his parents also came, as did Catherine and Sara. They all had presents for the baby, mostly outfits that were way too big for the baby.
He went back to work that night and once again it was good to not think about the numbers on the monitor. More people came to see Morten the next day and he just tried to keep them quiet so the stats didn’t fluctuate too wildly. It was a daunting task changing the diaper on a child so small and it exhausted the baby completely. He focused on all the practical things that had to be done and let Nick entertain the visitors. He just couldn’t bring himself to look away from the monitor long enough to talk to anyone but the medical staff.
Pairing: Nick and Greg
Rating: R
Summary: Brass has some bad news
Genre: Angst
Disclaimer: They belong to the CBS and not me
Warning/Spoiler: Set after Grave Danger
Brass came marching down the hall with a more annoyed footfall than normal. He wondered who had been given Brass’ case.
“Is Nick with you?” He didn’t know Brass as well as the others did, but the pain in the man’s eyes was evident.
“Nope, he and Sara were the lucky winners of a sleazy bar complete with two DB’s”
“Louise’s mother has been attacked.” Brass stated and his world shattered like the lab had in the explosion.
“How…how is she?” He stuttered and gripped the older detective.
“Badly beaten, they’re taken her to Desert Palms.” Brass caught him as he knees gave in.
“She called in the attack herself, her ex did it.” His head or the hallway was spinning madly.
“Fuck!” He whispered in horror.
“I’ll take you there now Greg.” Brass led him out to the waiting police car and raced to Desert Palms with the siren howling and the lights flashing.
“Nick it’s Brass, Louise’s mother has been attacked by her ex. I’m taking Greg to Desert now.” Brass had called Nick to give him the bad news.
“Okay I’ll make sure they let you in.” Brass’ voice was drifting away as Vegas passed in blue flashes.
“I don’t fucking care! Find the bastard!” Brass barked into the radio pulling him back to the present moment. He tried to say something, but only a few incoherent words came out. He gripped the dashboard hard when Brass yanked the vehicle across two lanes.
“Every cop from here to Houston is looking for him.” Brass said in what he took to be a worried sympathetic voice.
Brass barked at the receptionist and any other staff within earshot until they were allowed into the room where Mette was. There were 5 people in various kinds of gowns milling around the prone form on the gurney. His mind tried to take in the scene before him, tried to hear the stats reported from the nurse to his left, tried to hear what the doctor in the safety goggles was saying, tried to hear what the woman with the stethoscope said and tried to see how severe her injuries were.
Somebody dressed him in a gown and put on gloves.
“Mr. Sanders?” The female voice was strong and clear, much like his grandmothers.
“Ye-yes what… how bad is it?” His voice was low and quivering.
“She has sustained several blows to her head and stomach.” His eyes locked on the round belly on the gurney.
“… to her, but she has gone into labor.” He shook his head in disbelief.
“It’s 8 weeks early, 8…” The doctor wearing the safety goggles shouted a string of orders and a few words seeped into his brain: Collapsed lung, CT and NICU.
“Mr. Sanders maybe you should step outside.” The strong female voice suggested but he was frozen in place.
“No, I have to be here. Have to be here for the baby.” He fought to get the words out.
“It’ll get bloody.” The strong female voice said.
The statement reached deep inside him and he turned to face her.
“I’m a CSI! Blood is part of the job description.” He spat the words out in disgust. The doctor with the safety goggles barked another series of orders and the woman dragged him to one side of the room. His mind listed all the possible side effects of being born 8 weeks premature that he had ever read about. It was not a pretty list and for each word out of the doctor’s mouth, his heart broke more than he ever had imagined possible.
Suddenly the strong female voice held up a small slimy fetus, he smiled to fight the gag reflex.
“It’s a small boy.” She handed the baby to a new person in the room.
“1850 grams and 42 centimeters…” Whatever else was said drowned on the way to his mind. He was simply to busy remembering survival and disability stats for prematurely born children with that weight. If he recalled correctly the baby had a good chance of normal life, provided intensive medical care was given right away.
“…name. Do you have a name for him Mr. Sanders?” The strong female voice obtained his attention and his disoriented brain grasped randomly for a name.
“William Nicholas Stokes Sanders.” He stammered. There was two people working with the fetus and despite everything happening in the room, the only thing he heard was that there was no crying. There was nothing to indicate that the baby was alive.
More orders and stats were shouted by the various people in the room. He knew what they meant, but his brain utterly refused to put them together, just like it ignored the blood on the floor and the doctor who had both his hands inside Mette.
“Follow Nurse Walters up to the NICU.” The strong female voice grabbed him by the elbow and sent him after the nurse leaving with the incubator holding his little boy.
He sensed nothing but the baby as he rushed after the nurse. Doctors and nurses told him a million things while they worked on the baby and he tried to remember it all. It would be important to remember it all. The baby’s life would depend on him remembering it all so he could provide the care needed for the baby. He listened and listened and eventually the baby was placed in a room with 3 other babies.
There was a chair next to the incubator and someone pushed him down into it. From there he could see the monitor that the baby had been hooked up to. There were several graphs and numbers on the monitor. He knew what each of them measured and he knew how much or how little fluctuation was acceptable for each value. How he had come to know it, was not something he could remember however.
Nick placed a strong arm across his shoulders, but he couldn’t make himself turn away from the monitor and the tiny baby.
“Sorry I couldn’t make it sooner baby.” Nick’s soft words drifted into his mind.
“It’s okay.” He whispered back not moving, since he was afraid to disturb the baby.
“William Nicholas Stokes Sanders.” Nick read the name loud from the nametag on his wrist.
“They demanded a name.” The heart rate increased by 5 and he held his breath until it slowed to its previous level.
“…it.” Nick’s words didn’t make it through to him.
“Keep your voice down, he reacts strongly to sounds.” He whispered the warning to Nick. The heart rate increased again, but only by 2.
“I said I don’t think we should call him that.” Nick whispered into his ear. He shrugged his shoulders and waited for the heart rate to return to normal.
“Morten William Sanders.” Nick held him tight and he shrugged his shoulders again.
“Mette was still in surgery when I arrived and if Brass hadn’t been here I wouldn’t have been let in to see our baby.” Nick planted a kiss to his cheek. All the numbers on the screen fluctuated when the baby moved his tiny arm.
“He’s so small.” He could hear that Nick was on the brink of crying. He gently placed his hand on the one resting on his shoulder.
“It would have been better if he had weighed just 200 grams more, less than half a pound.” His voice was calm quiet and detached.
“Have you called your parents?” He had no idea what to answer Nick, because he could only remember having thought about.
“Are you okay with the name?” He just nodded, not really caring about anything except the stats on the monitor.
“I’m just gonna go make some calls.” Nick pressed a kiss to his lips and only habit made him return the kiss. His eyes returned to the monitor as soon as Nick left. Suddenly an alarm went off and a myriad of people came into the room. It took him forever to realize that it was one of the other babies and then let out the breath that had been caught in his throat.
“Momma said….” The heart rate was increasing steadily and it was probably all the fuzz created by the alarm that caused it.
“…in tomorrow.” He blinked and looked at Nick for a brief moment before turning his eyes back to the monitor.
“… biggest manhunt in…” Words from Nick drifted in between the fluctuating heart rate.
“Papa Olaf …” All the people that had rushed in before left in small groups and the heart rate slowed to a more acceptable level.
A glass of juice was pressed into his hand and he drank it without paying any attention to the taste of it. Nick had left again and a tiny blond nurse had gone over the procedure for him to touch the baby. He had scrubbed his hands red and then disinfected them before gently cupping the baby’s head with his left hand since the right one had taken up shaking again. The small warm head sent shockwaves through his body, he felt with an unwanted clarity how soft and unfinished the scull still was.
The tiny blond nurse allowed him to help feed the baby via the tube down his throat; he was still too weak to suckle. After the baby had been fed the stats behaved out of sync and he pressed the alarm button. The tiny blond nurse came back with a doctor who had really bad acne on his face. The doctor explained in great detail how the baby would react to being fed and changed and touched and how the blanket should be tucked around him.
Had his heart not already been shattered in infinitely many pieces, the doctor’s words would certainly have done it.
“Pappa.” Louise reached up for him to lift her up and he wondered just how she came to be there. He picked her up making a mental note to scrub his hands before touching the baby again. A warm strong hand landed on his neck and he looked up at Nick, who radiated concern and worry.
“They’ll change the name on his papers real soon.” He vaguely recalled Nick talking about the name previously, but it didn’t matter.
“You have to disinfect your hands if you want to touch him and you can only hold your hand to his head. Being touched is very stressful for him.” They spoke in hushed voices like the other people in the room.
He had lost all notion of time, the only thing he knew was the stats on the monitor and the baby. For some weird reason he also knew that Mette was out of surgery and in the ICU and that the injuries to her body had been repaired, but the swelling in her brain was still something that the doctors worried about. He had no idea who had told him or when. Nick had disappeared with Louise and when he looked at his watch there was only an hour to shift began.
“Greg what are you doing here?” Grissom stared at him in disbelief when he met his boss halfway to the locker room.
“I work here.” There were times where he seriously thought that his boss had some mental disorder and a question like that could only cooperate to that.
“But aren’t you supposed to go on leave?” Grissom had his blue eyes wide apart in shock.
“Not until I can take him home. Unless they’re critical you can’t stay at the ward at nights, so I might as well work.” He felt strange having to explain something so simple to his boss.
He worked hard and focused all night and it was such a relief not to be in that way too warm hospital ward, where the only thing to break the silence were the breast pumps and alarms. For eight hours he didn’t have to worry about stats on a screen and tiny jerky moves in a incubator.
At one point during shift Nick dragged him off to the men’s room.
“You never told me if you like the name?” Nick held him by the shoulders and just looked into his eyes.
“The name?” He knew it should mean something, but he just couldn’t remember.
“Yeah… Morten William Sanders. I thought the other was a bit too much and this also carries his mother’s name.” He blinked and something in his brain nodded in recognition.
“Oh yeah that’s right, they asked me in the ER and I just said what came to mind first.” He could barely remember what name he had said. Nick took his wrist with the nametag and held it for him to read. William Nicholas Stokes Sanders.
“I love you Greg.” Nick lowered his voice and finished off with a kiss.
“I love you too.” He leaned into the kiss and Nick’s strong body.
“I don’t blame you for being so out of it today doll.” Nick cooed.
“He’s so small. It’ll be moths before he can fit any of the baby things that I’ve bought.” He melted into the hug and allowed a few tears to trickle down his cheeks.
“You know you really don’t have to work.” Nick spoke ever so softly.
“But I’d still have to leave at night, he’s not critical and nothing’s wrong with me.”
“Just let me know if you need a break, yeah?”
“I’ll be fine Nick. You take care of Louise and I’ll be there for him. I think I’m better with hospitals these days anyways.” He hated hospitals but Nick’s trauma still sat too deep for the Texan to spend all day there.
“If that’s what you want baby.” Nick kissed him and for a few deep passionate kisses everything was fine.
After shift they went home and he took a quick shower before leaving for the hospital again. The baby was sleeping when he arrived and all the stats were fine. He disinfected his hands and held his hand against the tiny head. It was still soft and warm and his touch provoked an increase in the heart rate. Nick came by with Louise and stayed for some hours he guessed. Jillian and his parents also came, as did Catherine and Sara. They all had presents for the baby, mostly outfits that were way too big for the baby.
He went back to work that night and once again it was good to not think about the numbers on the monitor. More people came to see Morten the next day and he just tried to keep them quiet so the stats didn’t fluctuate too wildly. It was a daunting task changing the diaper on a child so small and it exhausted the baby completely. He focused on all the practical things that had to be done and let Nick entertain the visitors. He just couldn’t bring himself to look away from the monitor long enough to talk to anyone but the medical staff.
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no subject
Date: 2005-10-19 11:57 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-10-20 12:03 am (UTC)It was terrible hard to write, but the idea was there and wouldn't go away. I have the next part planned out and will start writing soon. But damn it broke my heart to write this.
/A
no subject
Date: 2005-10-20 12:17 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-10-20 12:22 am (UTC)But then somebody posted 'fly boys' to save my night.
Thank you.
/A
no subject
Date: 2005-10-20 12:25 am (UTC)Heh, glad to help in cheering you up. Hope you like it! ;)
no subject
Date: 2005-10-20 12:34 am (UTC)Loved and reviewed at desert.
/A
no subject
Date: 2005-10-20 12:28 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-10-20 12:40 am (UTC)It was so hard to make his disillusion show. I tried several angles to it, before I went with this one. I know that life has already treated them bad, but this was bound to happen.
You rarely get away from a possesive violent bastard that easy and just bad luck for Greg to be caught in the middle so to speak. I am so glad that the anxiety was 'good', because it wasn't easy.
The next chapter will take quite an effort for sure, but I have a plan for it. I think it'll take me some days to get it done.
/A
no subject
Date: 2005-10-20 01:36 am (UTC)1. It made me cry
2. It broke my heart
Although the chapter was very well written, as is the rest of the story, I have problems with things like this. My cousin was a premeature baby, and now his new little sister was three months early because my Aunt got mugged. Kind of scary though because this happened a year to date ago...
no subject
Date: 2005-10-20 09:02 am (UTC)Coincidences of this kind are strange, but given just how many times things like that happen a year, they are bound to happen.
It is very sad for your aunt. My sisters best friend had both her children early and though the second was less critical she broke down over that, because she felt it was her fault since it was the second time it happened.
I am always glad to hear people tell me that they find my stories well written, it really means a lot and it makes it easier to continue.
I plan to put all the broken hearts together in the next chapter.
/A