#patient is fully sentient and responsive and yet has a blood pressure of 50 over 35? holy fuck what the fuck

[iliterallydecepticanteven]

Combining the idea that Teresa wants to work in the ICU and the idea that Mac has energon poisoning, I've been given the following:

Mac, sitting in the emergency room holding a bucket of her own glowing vomit and looking like death warmed over: huh, that's new

Teresa: IT CERTAINLY FUCKING IS

Wig you have given me a wonderful idea for a drabble, please enjoy:

Teresa had bounced between multiple different hospitals in her time working as a travel nurse. She knows the ins and outs, the dangers of the profession, and what the various codes mean. Code blue is cardiac arrest, code red is a fire, code pink is someone trying to kidnap a kid, code aqua is part of the building is flooding, code white is get security to me now, code silver is someone's grandpa wandered off again, and so on. Those were the most common she heard on her usual shifts and she'd called a couple of them herself.

However, as she bounced between her two ICU patients, thinking about if she should text Emily about bringing home dinner, she freezes in place as the overhead intercom crackles to life.

"Code orange in emergency department, code orange in emergency department. Stay clear of area."

"What the fuck?" she mutters. The emergency department was a meager floor below them.

One of the nursing students with them on shift gives her a confused look. "What's code orange for?"

"Hazardous materials that aren't biohazardous. Usually radiation or chemical spills," she says, stepping behind the counter of the nurses station.

The phone rang and Teresa nearly jumped out of her skin. The charge nurse answers it and Teresa takes a few deep calming breaths. She tries to remind herself that it probably wasn't that bad. Someone probably cracked the container of one of the xray machines or spilled cleaning chemicals.

"Teresa?" She turns at the sound of her name. The charge nurse had one hand over the receiver of the phone. "You have radiation and hazardous material safety training right?"

Her stomach twists as she sighs, "Yeah."

Teresa had worked in her far share of various wards and units while traveling. She had oncological experience handling both chemotherapy patients and radiation patients. Whatever was happening must have been a mix as she had been told to gown, double glove, put on a respirator and face shield, and a lead vest with an EPD. She was pulling her disposable shoe covers on when the elevator dings.

Teresa was already in the patient's designated room. It was at the very end of the unit and had no one in the neighboring rooms to reduce the chances of cross contamination. She's not sure what she's expecting to be wheeled in. She had seen gruesome sights in her career. Everything from fourth degree burns to necrotic limbs to chemical burns down to the bone. She always expects the worst and hopes for the best.

The bed is wheeled into the room and Teresa freezes in shock.

Her patient is a young woman, looking small against the stark white sheets, still wearing street clothes, and clutching a bucket in her lap. Her eyes are glossy and something bright blue is dribbling from the side of her mouth.

Transport gets the bed into place and Teresa steps into the hall to take report. The patient, Mackenzie Adam, came into the emergency department complaining of gastrointestinal distress, high fever, trouble focusing, and a migraine. She then proceeded to vomit into a bucket, the contents of which were described as "unnaturally blue" and set off the radiation warning system. Vitals had been taken, blood type and allergies unknown, and she scored an eleven on the Glasgow Coma Scale.

"Great," Teresa says, clapping her hands together.

"We're trying to pull doctors to come and see her right now, it's just, we don't know what's wrong so we don't know who to send," the nurse says.

"It's fine. I'll take vitals and see what her complaints are," Teresa says.

She steps back into the room and smiles wide enough that it translates to her eyes. "Hi Mackenzie, can you tell me where you are right now?"

Mackenzie blinks slowly before mumbling, "Hospital."

Teresa gently places a monitor onto one of her fingers. She glances into the bucket and bites back a wince at the glowing contents. "Wonderful. Do you know which hospital?"

"Mercy," she mumbles.

"Correct," Teresa says. Slowly increasing that GCS was always good. She taps at her patient monitor, bringing it to life, and begins reading her vitals. Then she does a double take and reads them again. Just to be sure, she fishes a thermometer out of her pocket and swipes it across Mackenzie's forehead.

"What's wrong?" the woman asks her.

Teresa hesitates before answering, "Well, your vitals are a bit concerning. Your heartrate is a little high, as is your blood pressure, but still within range. And your oxygen saturation is phenomenal. But your temperature is very high and we need to bring it down."

Teresa had seen high temperatures before. She had encountered her fair share of hyperpyrexia patients and coaxed their 106 degree fevers down within normal range. She had seen patients hit 108 and watched their bodies give out.

The temperature on the monitor and her own thermometer read 125 degrees Fahrenheit. By all modern medical logic, Teresa should be standing next to a corpse, not someone who looked like she was suffering through the worst hangover of her life.

"Oh. I do feel kinda warm," Mackenzie says. She begins to shift around, pulling at her coat, and Teresa breaks out of her daze to help her.

With her arms free, she should start an IV line on her, start getting fluids in at the very least, and pull blood samples. But that grinds to a halt when she looks down at her patient's arms.

"Do you know what's wrong with me?" Mackenzie asks her. Her heartrate has increased.

Teresa snaps her eyes back. Normally, this was the point when she should be forcing a reassuring smile onto her face and saying she'd get the doctor. But there was no doctor right now.

"I am not a doctor, so I cannot give you an official diagnosis," Teresa begins. "But I can point out abnormalities."

She walks over to the light switch and flicks it off. The room is illuminated only by the meager light from the hallway, the dying sun outside, and a third source. She walks back to the bedside and gently grabs one of Mackenzie's wrists, turning her arm over to expose the underside of her forearm.

"See how it looks like your veins are glowing?" she asks.

Mackenzie nods and in the low light Teresa sees that it's not just her veins. The sclera of her eyes were tinted the same luminescent blue.

"They're not supposed to fucking do that," Teresa says.

"Oh," Mackenzie replies and Teresa has to bite back a nervous laugh. The whole situation felt so surreal, so fake, so inane. She wondered if she was going to wake up to this all being some wild dream.

As she snaps the light back on, she hears Mackenzie mumble, "I don't feel good." It's the only warning she gets before the woman goes lax and the monitor screams as she flatlines. Teresa curses to herself before calling a code blue.

Twenty-eight minutes of chest compressions and an ungodly amount of epinephrine later, Mackenzie is sitting up in her bed, asking for some water, surrounded by confused neurologists, cardiologists, hematologists, and toxicologists.

Teresa has retreated to the clean stock room to take a moment to compose herself by sitting on a box of clean linens and whispering, "What the actual fuck."