Hey, Greene. Tell me you are not giving free needles to junkies.
Mark: On a case-by-case basis.
No, no, no, no, on no basis, it's illegal.
Not if there's a public health emergency which there is.
How much of your brain did they cut out?
This does not put extra needles on the street.
I don't care. We're not gonna have a bunch of low-life junkies parading in and out of here.
So you're not interested in cutting back on HIV and... [struggling to get the word out]
And? What? Sounds like..?
Hep? Heparin? Heptathlon?
Tough one. Tell you what, you wanna start a needle exchange do it from your house.
Kerry, we have a little personnel problem; well, you do. Mark Greene.
Yeah. He's walking around with attitude, he's handing out needles, he's blanking out on words...
Yeah, it's swelling from the chemotherapy wafers.
[Sarcastically] Well... really.
He has mild expressive aphasia. It's temporary.
Well, I don't think he likes it, either.
Now come on, you haven't noticed any personality changes?
Like he got very confrontational with me.
Well, you're used to confrontation, Robert.
We are not talking about me.
Isn't that your favorite subject?
[to Luka] When did you lose your faith? I've found with most people it comes and goes like intimacy in a relationship. Sometimes, it's so strong: a passion, rapture, and then, at other times, it's impossible, distant, lost. But that's not God, that's us. We put up our own barriers with our egos and our pain. He's always there no matter what.
How long have you been having trouble breathing?
I'm just... gathering my strength.
We have to go to the hospital.
Pretty, isn't it? The snow. So much beauty.
Where's the phone? I need to call an ambulance...
-No, please, I only need a minute.
Evidently. As I was sitting here, I was reminded of the night I chose to become a priest. I'd been struggling with it for a long time, several years. Anyway, that night, I couldn't sleep so I got up and went out for a walk in the woods behind my father's house. It was snowing like it is now. I don't have any idea how long I walked but, at a certain point, I suddenly realized I didn't know which way to go. I'd gotten lost, I was frightened. As I looked up into that dark night, He came to me. I saw all those millions of snowflakes drifting down toward me, so still... So peaceful... Perfect. And I was filled with the love of our Lord, Jesus Christ like pouring wine into an empty glass. I'm afraid I may have wasted my life. For some reason I never accomplished the things that I should have, what God wanted of me and now I'm frightened... I'm afraid of dying. There, I said it. I am afraid to die.
We have to go to the hospital.
[quoting Psalm 23] "The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. He maketh me to lie down in green pastures. He leaders beside the still waters..."
How'd your personality test go?
I scored somewhere between serial killer and talk show host.
I thought they were memory tests.
What's next? Rorschach? Spelling bee?
Swimwear competition, sudden-death Twister. Who knows? Maybe a chili cook-off.
Then I'd better hear it now.
That's what you came here for, isn't it?
I wanted to check on you.
You're searching for your faith. You think you lost it, but you only buried it. It's never left you. In the name of the Father, and the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, amen. May God, who enlightens every heart, help you to know your sins and trust in his mercy.
Luka, your heart is burdened. Talk to me. Let me take that burden with me.
I don't know, I, uh, lost my family. Danijela, my wife, she wanted to move out of Vukovar but I had to finish my internship and soon it was too late, it wasn't safe to move. I was going to get some supplies and ai made them stay behind. I was just crossing the street when the mortar shell hit the apartment building.
[As Luka speaks, he has a flashback of running into his burning apartment building as air-raid sirens wail]
So, I went out to get some supplies... I made them stay behind. I was just crossing the street when a mortar shell hit the apartment building. [throws up his hands in a gesture of finality]
I ran inside, there were my neighbors, hurt, bleeding, dying. I passed them by. I had to get to my family. A piece of shrapnel had torn into Danijela's spleen, and she was bleeding to death. When I turned back to my daughter, she wasn't breathing. I lost the pulse but, as long as I kept doing CPR and breathing for my daughter, I thought she had a chance. I could only pray that someone would get there to help. If I"d picked up Danijela at that moment and gotten her to the hospital she could have had surgery, you know? She could have lived but I couldn't leave my little girl. I waited and prayed. I prayed someone would come.
[quietly] And no one came.
No one came. I called out for hours as I sat there, breathing for her, doing CPR. [pause] I finally had to stop, from exhaustion. I lost them all.
You couldn't sacrifice the one, to save the other. Even if you had, you'd still blame yourself.
[Luka leans forward and begins crying into his hands; Stewart gently lays his hand on Luka's head]
These things can't be explained. Why it happens, the Providence of God, and the mysteries of life and death... are the very fiber of our faith. [pause] They were gifts, of love and life. You are a gift of love and life. Don't turn your back on them. God, Father of all mercies, through the death and resurrection of your only begotten son, has reconciled himself to the world and sent the Holy Spirit among us for the forgiveness of sins through the ministry of Holy Church. May God give you pardon and peace and I absolve you of all your sins in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Dr. Carter, are you deaf? I keep shouting, you keep getting on the elevator?
Is this the pre-op amputation?
No, this is the post-op amputation.
Yes, he was trapped, his pressure was dropping. Dr. Benton talked me through it.
Oh, what did they use, a chainsaw? You did this?
There was nobody else to do it.
Oh, well, no one else could do it. Well, by all means, then, let's get whoever's available. [to paramedic] Maybe you ought to try it it next time.
Yeah, maybe if you'd respond to your page...
I can't wear my pager in the dojo. Brenda knew where I was; you should have called her. Let's go. What the hell happened, anyway? You blew it on the first leg, you decided to do the other one?
[Luka blows on his coffee to wake Abby up.]
Luka I think one of the kids from the coffee shop broke into the apartment.
I don't believe in breakfast.
It's the most important meal of the day.
That's never been medically proven.
