doctor baran al hashimi.

He seizes the next opportunity that presents itself, subtly gripping her by the forearm to lead her out to the stairwell, a more private location. It takes all he has in him not to shout when the agonizingly slow safety mechanism finally allows the door to shut. He needs to maintain some sort of decorum. One of them, after all, needs to be the mature one here.

“I don’t know what you’re playing at, but I can’t very well leave my ED in the hands of someone who is more concerned with restructuring the current system in place, rather than with keeping things afloat.”

Distance is maintained between them, for fear he might lose his cool, his subconscious already unraveling at how shamelessly defiant she is. Does she really think he’s going to stand by and let her dismantle his empire like this? No doubt it’s a fucking tragedy of an empire, but it’s his empire nonetheless.

and yet... she didn't see him coming. she had gotten lost in the rhythm of a new hospital, learning how it worked, how he made it work and she kept finding him everywhere. in samira's confidence, in the fast, steady hands of every intern and resident, in the very cadence of the place.

she grew so distracted searching for traces of him that she failed to notice the man himself.

❛ i see, ❜ she says, eyes darting around to locate herself before settling on him, a small vee of frustration forming between her brows. ❛ now that i've told you, on the eve of your departure what my plans are, you suddenly are rethinking yours. ❜ she is quiet for a few moments, watching him. ❛ and i don't blame you. clearly you are passionate about your work, and you only want what is best for it, you would be right to rethink your plans. ❜

Baran + her frustrated neck thing

Hm, noted. Doctor Al-Hashimi, maybe not a fan of darker humour. Richie's been feeling that out across the ED for a bit, with varying degrees of success. This? Perhaps not one of the better attempts.

With a click of his tongue, he casts a hand through the air dismissively. "Another life." Nothing to worry about, his tone suggests. Bad joke. "Forget I said anything."

she does not linger there, taking the offered change of subject with a grateful smile.

He’s being needlessly harsh. But for fuck’s sake, as the chief of emergency medicine, hasn’t he earned that right? Never mind his incessant need to be in control. That’s neither here, nor there. It’s not that he believes Al-Hashimi to be incompetent. She can be the most qualified, gifted replacement on the fucking Eastern Seaboard, but she’s not him. Only he knows how this complicated, chaotically fragile machine works, with its precarious cogs and coils that must remain well oiled to his level of satisfaction.

The fact of the matter is simply this: Baran is not Robby. 

He will say this though, albeit to himself: she sure knows how to put up her dukes and fight back. Were she not monopolizing responsibility for the wellbeing of his ED in his absence, he might admit to being mildly impressed. 

“Yes, because I’m embarking on a mandatory sabbatical,” he reminds pointedly with a quick tilt of his head, “That, Dr. Al, is the reason you’re here.”

Despite her calmness, her tone is cool, laced with venom that would be otherwise untraceable by the senses. She means to put him out of his misery, her eyes as sharp as a blade. He forces a smile in response. 

lips press together, followed by a large exhale of breath, careful control slipping at his bait. she wants to argue. to go through each point in detail. hands itch for a pen so she can draw every one of his mistakes in paper, forcing him to look at what she is seeing instead of living in his own blinded world.

it would be the mature thing to do.

instead, she matches his smile, white teeth flashing.

the chaos of the emergency department helped to mask some the ceaseless explosions from the fireworks. so, lucia decided to hang around instead of slipping back upstairs to her office; where she usually took care of her paperwork.

lucia took a deep, shaky breath as she dropped down her files down at the nurses' station. it wasn't the first time she'd hung around with dana and the team, so she knew everyone on their shift. however, there did seem to be a new face... headed right for her. ❛❛ doctor al-hashimi, right? ❜❜ lucia asked, offering a hesitant smile.

three days of examining faces. she made a game out of it. printed the miniatures and clipped them on her son's guess who game, bribing him with pancakes for dinner to play a few rounds with her. it wasn't anyone from the day shift, or the night shift, some other specialty then.

She’s certainly resilient. He’ll give her that much.

There’s a sharp, calculating shine in her dark eyes, like she’s playing a game of chess and determining her next three moves, as well as contingency moves. As they stare at each other pointedly, she’s surrounding him on the board, making any chance of escape impossible. The level at which she’s grown to recognize his tells in mere hours is utterly disconcerting, to say the least.

Muldoon said it best: Clever girl.

Robby maintains his smirk, determined to keep up the front of confidence. Fuck, there’s really something about her that makes him believe he might be in danger of wavering.

“Yeah, my people are strictly Old Testament, so I missed the lesson on sand vs. rock as a foundation. Still, I think I get the gist of it.”

He’s being harsh on her, but how can he not? The brazen woman can’t just come in here and flip everything on its ass and expect it to function a completely different way. It was just asking for catastrophe.

“You think I want to steal your job.”

Snorting humorously, as though he’s not the slightest bit threatened, Robby opts to rise from his seat and skirt around her cautiously, needing to move, let his blood circulate so he can better think.

so that was how he saw her. if he had such a problem with her, thought her so incompetent, he could have lifted a finger when the hospital was searching for a replacement --

it was his er when the work wasn't piling up on his desk.

❛⠀ didn't get to where i am by thinking like that. and where i am, is doing your job for the next three months. ⠀ ❜ a kid. a woman doing a man's job who didn't apologize for her presence: this wasn't the first time she got called that, would not be the last. but she made them eat their words, every single time.

Thinking of changing your bet? I am just weighing my odds