Chapter 6 - The Crash Cart Protocol
Upstairs in the NICU, the red warning lights on Owen’s incubator suddenly began to flash in a frantic, irregular rhythm.
Beep. Beep. Beep-beep-beep.
Priya rushed into the nursery, her heart leaping into her throat. She threw open the incubator porthole and checked the baby’s vitals.
Owen’s skin was pale, almost translucent. His tiny chest barely moved as he gasped for air, his heart rate plummeting from a healthy 140 beats per minute down to a terrifying 65.
“Code blue! NICU room seven!” Priya shouted into the wall intercom, smashing the emergency button with her palm. “We need pediatric crash cart assistance immediately!”
Within seconds, two junior nurses rushed into the room, their faces white with panic.
“What’s happening?” one nurse asked.
“His electrolytes have bottomed out,” Priya shouted, her hands moving with lightning speed as she detached the fraudulent IV line and flushed the catheter with a safe, balanced saline solution. “The prolonged starvation caused acute cardiac arrhythmia. If we don’t push potassium and intravenous glucose right now, we’re going to lose him!”
She prepped the syringe, sliding the needle into the tiny catheter line in Owen’s scalp.
“Breathe, little man,” Priya whispered fiercely, her eyes welling with tears as she watched the flatlining rhythm on the cardiac monitor. “Just breathe.”
Suddenly, the heavy doors of the NICU swung open.
Weston Kade strode into the room, his coat gone, his shirt sleeves still rolled up, followed closely by Marcus. When Weston saw the flashing red lights and his son’s motionless chest, the color drained entirely from his face.
“Priya,” Weston choked out, his voice cracking for the first time since she had met him. “What’s happening?”
“His heart is failing from the prolonged starvation!” Priya shouted over the alarms. “He’s crashing! I need epinephrine, now!”
Marcus didn't hesitate. He grabbed the emergency tray from the crash cart, handing vials to Priya with the steady hands of a combat medic.
Weston pushed past the medical equipment, pressing his face against the glass of the incubator, his large hands trembling.
“Owen,” Weston whispered, his voice breaking into a ragged sob. “Owen, look at me. Don't you dare leave me. You hear me? Your mother is waiting for us. Don’t you dare give up.”
Priya administered the epinephrine directly into the line, her fingers flying across the cardiac monitor controls, adjusting the oxygen flow, tapping the baby’s tiny heel to stimulate circulation.
For three agonizing seconds, the monitor emitted a long, continuous, uninterrupted tone.
A flatline.
Deathly silence filled the room, broken only by the steady dripping of the IV fluid. Priya pressed her palms against the baby’s fragile chest, beginning chest compressions with two fingers, her face a mask of fierce, unyielding determination.
“Come on,” she muttered through clenched teeth. “Come on, baby. Stay with us.”
Thump.
The monitor skipped.
Thump-thump.
The green line jagged upward. A weak, irregular heartbeat stuttered back to life on the screen.
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Owen let out a tiny, pathetic mewl—the sweetest sound Priya had ever heard in her entire life.
Weston let out a breath he felt like he had been holding for three weeks, sliding down the side of the glass incubator until he was kneeling on the cold floor, his head bowed in overwhelming relief.
