Mending Broken Hearts-2

Pause and Reflect

This was a really fun chapter to write mostly because I am excited for Grey's season 18 to drop later this month!!! It's going to be amazing. Addison is back and I can't wait to write her interactions with Gen even though I'm only on season 11 and I have a ways to go before that happens. But I still can't wait to share with you all what I planned.

"Benoist!" I jump hearing Owen bellow for me.

"Uh...yes, Chief?"

"You knew about Herman."

"Yes, sir, I did."

"And you didn't want to tell anyone."

"It was her medical privacy. But sir, before you get angry once I found out, I reviewed all of her previous surgeries and watched all of her current ones. I was making sure she didn't make a mistake. I was watching her, sir." I assure Owen.

"She has a tumor."

"And she's dying. Taking her job away when she's not endangering anyone would be killing her. She deserved to go out with some dignity and...I made sure she got it." I defend.

"You were watching her."

"Like a hawk. Every cut, stitch, and movement she made, I was double-checking her. I was ready to tell her to quit and inform the board. I was prepared to do that." Both of our pagers go off.

"Herman wants us." Owen says. I follow him into the room Amelia has taken over with Nicole's scans.

"Finally, you both made it." Nicole greets us.

"What's going on?" I ask.

"Herman is willing to talk about a treatment plan." Arizona speaks up first.

"She's willing to let me cure her." Amelia adds.

"And how are you going to do that?" Owen asks her.

"See this here." Amelia points to one of the scans. "This linear hypointensity? It is a CSF plane. That's what can give me a clean dissection. If I leave behind one billionth of a malignancy, the tumor will be back, so I am going to have to use every tool in the box... C.U.S.A., lasers, fluorescein, radioactive seeds. I will not stop until I have completely decimated each and every last cell." Amelia finishes feeling so confident in her abilities. "Chief? What do you think?" Owen looks briefly at Nicole.

"It is...complex, and it is risky." Owen says.

"I see three scenarios here." Nicole jumps in. "One, Shepherd operates, and I die on the table. Two Shepherd operates and resects something she shouldn't, and I wake up gorked, and three least likely of all, Shepherd operates, remove all of the tumor, and I wake up alive, deficit-free. Am I right?" She looks at Amelia directly.

"Yes. But as I..."

"How far does the tumor need to reach before it becomes impossible to resect in its entirety?" Nicole interrupts Amelia.

"Nicole." I use a warning tone with her. "Do not tempt fate more than you already are."

"We need to do this now." Amelia says.

"How far?" Nicole ignores us both.

"Once it goes through the optic apparatus and breaches the hypothalamus, there's no way. I won't touch it. If...if you clot or bleed, it's too risky." Amelia details.

"I agree with Amelia, Nicole. Think of the risks. Waiting puts you at a risk of this not working." I try and get through to her.

"No, but it gives me time." Nicole argues. "We wait. And when the tumor starts threatening the optic nerve and heading to the hypothalamus, you can operate." She says to Amelia.