#baconcanons

"They have you working nights?" Jim asked. 

Leonard nodded, taking a long sip of his fresh coffee. "Better than a rotating shift." 

"What about classes? Will you ever sleep?" 

"The powers that be are working around my school schedule, they realize I'm just a cadet and need time for studying. But this way I can stay in practice, and earning some extra credits wouldn't hurt." 

Jim nodded, considering he was taking nearly double the normal course load of a first year cadet, he couldn't criticize Bones for packing his schedule. "Think you'll see anything interesting?"

Leonard shrugged and downed the rest of his coffee. "I'll let you know." 

+

Walking into Starfleet Medical's Emergency Department for his first shift was like coming home for Leonard. This was a world he knew and was comfortable with.  ED's, no matter the location, tended to be run exactly the same way. And working nights wasn't new to him either. 

Night shifts in the ED were comfortable for Leonard in their consistencies.  Drug reps and administrators never showed up at after midnight. The coffee was strong and the donuts stale. The cafeteria was never open. And instead of a suit and tie, scrubs and scruff were expected.  

Night time brought in most of the trauma cases. Also, a lot of babies and new parents.  

Leonard McCoy had always loved kids. 

+

"BABY WON'T STOP CRYING"  was written in big bold letters under 'chief complaint'.  

It really could be anything. Babies are obligate nose breathers. If their nasal passages are blocked, they won't be able to breath, unless they're crying. It could be something as simple as nasal congestion. But it could also be something more life-threatening...  

Mind whirling with possibilities, Leonard grabbed the patient chart from the rack and walked into the patient's room with authority. 

The baby was definitely making herself known. 

"Woah, wow!" Leonard winced as a sharp wail accosted his ear, "What's the problem sweetheart?"  

He gently cooed at the baby as the frazzled looking mother practically thrust the child into the doctor's arms. 

"She won't stop screaming," she shouted over another shrill blast from the babe. 

Then, miracle of miracles, the awful wailing ground to a halt, like someone had flipped a switch. Leonard looked down in alarm, wondering if the child had actually passed out. But a pair of beautiful blue eyes gazed up into his, in fascination.  Tiny fingers reached out to try and grab his nose. 

Leonard smiled, "Hey there beautiful." 

"What did you do?" The mom asked in awe, "She really has been screaming like that for hours." 

"I'm not sure," Leonard shrugged and caught the baby's gaze, "Are you sick sweetheart? Or are you just trying to drive your momma crazy?" 

The little girl's only answer was to blow a raspberry. 

"Well then," he mused. Sick, or Not Sick, that was the question. It sounds easy enough, but McCoy knew from experience that it wasn't always that simple. 

Sometimes it was. Sometimes it wasn't. 

And it was a good idea to never get comfortable or make assumptions. 

Bouncing the baby a little as he walked around the room, Leonard asked the standard questions. 'How long has this been going on? Is anyone else sick at home or daycare?' And so on.

Leonard's mind sorted over the possibilities of potential problems and likely approaches to find the solution, if there was one.  Part of his brain warned him to test for any signs of impending disaster, and another suggested he enjoy the break from the drug seekers and drunks.  The loudest thought was voiced from Len's personal past and it offered a bittersweet warning... 

"She's fine," Len assured his wife after she passed him their six-month old daughter. 

"I think she's sick,"Jocelyn announced, looking worried.

Len glanced over the wiggling baby. He had just got home from a double shift at the local pediatric hospital and his mind rebelled at the possibility of another sick kid.  He dangerously catered to the arrogant little voice in his head that shrugged off the new mother worries. He was the real doctor out of the two of them after all. 

"I'll watch her while you get some rest," he suggested. 

It sounded considerate, but what he really wanted was for Jocelyn to stop staring at him so he could watch the Ol' Miss game he'd recorded.  His wife quirked an eyebrow at him but eventually wandered off, leaving him to prop their daughter up on the couch beside him. He quickly became engrossed in the game, ignoring Joanna's quiet, grunting respirations. 

Thank God for that new mother instinct.

"How's she doing?" Len's wife asked, half an hour later, moving to stand in front of the screen, arms crossed. 

"I thought you were going to bed," Len said, trying to look around her at the screen.  

"I thought you were going to watch her," she insisted, picking up the baby. "I think she's sick, Len." 

He couldn't ignore the clear anxiety in his wife's eyes and moved to reassure her. 

But thats when he noticed the slight gray cast to his daughter's skin. A clear indication of a fall in the oxygenation of her blood.  Len also noticed, to his increasing panic, her slowing respiration rate. From fatigue and not relaxation. 

It was like all the air had been sucked out of the room and Len's heart lurched like he'd been punched. Hard. 

If this continued it wouldn't be long before the kid stopped breathing. 

Kicking himself for not paying better attention, he took a deep breath and grabbed his keys. "I think we need to go back to the hospital," he said slowly, hoping he sounded calmer than he felt. 

The drive to the ED was tense and silent, except for the baby's soft crowing. 

Of course, Joanna had improved some by the time they arrived. Being exposed to the cool night air had reduced the swelling in her airway just enough to avert disaster.  Seeing her improvement, it was easy for him to feel a little apologetic for bringing her in like so many other new parents who jumped the gun with these things. But Len had always followed that gut feeling. And it was telling him now that they had one very sick little girl on their hands.  

He watched his friend and fellow ED physician, Danny, run through the examination.  

"I'm telling you. She looked pretty sick." 

"Gray, huh? You know I'll have to order some tests..." 

Len's heart sank. He knew exactly what tests they were going to run on his baby girl. It was the first time he actually had to experience the consequences of a doctor's words.  It took everything in him not to negotiate to forego the tests and skip right to therapy. He knew better though, and Dan would need to do this by the book. 

Len insisted his wife take a walk and get a coffee when the nurses came in to do the spinal tap. His baby's screams would echo in his nightmares for years to come and he knew Jocelyn wouldn't handle it any better. 

"She was hypoxic and acidotic," Danny told him after it was over. "I'm sending her up to the PICU, just in case we need to intubate."

 The nurses were already starting to crowd around Jo, putting in an IV and giving her oxygen. Len's heart broke at the sight.  Eyes burning, he looked into his friend's sympathetic eyes and nodded, "Thanks. Just do what you have to." 

Len spent the next week working in the Peds ER by day and sleeping in the PICU waiting room at night.  Every spare moment he had was spent standing by his daughter's little bed. He held Joanna's tiny hand while she fought hard to pull in a full breath.  It took a while, but when Joanna finally reached for his face and smiled around the oxygen tubing, he stopped beating himself up about the whole thing and thanked his stars for giving him such a strong kid.  

"Do you have children?" the mother asked after Leonard finished waltzing her baby up and down the room. 

"Yes," he smiled, resisting the urge to go on about Joanna.  He finished the examination, but even after double checking, he still couldn't find anything of note.  When he handed the child back to the young mother she immediately began to fuss again.  

"Mmm. I thought we had her. Lets try feeding her and see how it goes. Her vital signs are fine and I couldn't find anything that raised any red flags. We'll see how she does and then we'll decide whether we need to do a workup." 

He wouldn't hesitate to order the tests, but for now there wasn't anything to go off of. McCoy wasn't a fan of doing shotgun tests when he didn't know what he was looking for.  And if his gut was anything to go by... this time he didn't feel like the kid was sick. 

Over the course of the shift, he made a point to check back in periodically. The kid seemed to settle and grump in waves, with brief periods of wailing mixed in. Finally it was time to make a decision either way. 

Leonard walked back in and looked the child over one last time. She had begun screaming again and the mother was looking quiet exasperated. The child didn't seem to be distracted by his charm this time either. 

"I think we need to check some things on your daughter," he announced. The voices lobbying for "Sick" getting louder in his mind. 

All of a sudden there was a explosive squirting sound from her diaper.  Leonard eyed the cutie in his arms with a knowing look and checked her pants. 

"Woah, little girl, did that all come out of you?"

The little girl gurgled in satisfaction and promptly drifted off to sleep.  She looked perfectly normal. 

"Huh," he mused and passed the child back to the mother. He didn't want to be caught with changing that particular loaded bomb.  

He received a knowing look. It was the same one his wife had leveled at him many times.