Chapter One

It was a drizzling, cold Monday morning, when Ethan and Cal arrived at the Emergency Department. Cal was still nursing the last of his hangover which was still present after a particularly intense Saturday night out in Holby, and marched ahead of Ethan, draining the final dregs of coffee from a takeaway mug and tossing it towards the bin. It missed.

Sighing, Ethan bent to pick it up, firmly pushing it down onto the top of the rubbish spilling out of the bin already. The cleaners had enough to do. Why was Caleb always so keen to assume that everyone else could clean up after him. He stood up, and pulled the hand gel he always kept in his pocket out, cleaning his hands, just in case. Cal turned around.

'You've not even seen a patient yet. Come on, Nibbles.'

Ethan felt as drained as his brother's coffee cup. A month prior, he'd had a particularly awful accident to attend to with Alicia, a fire at a local funeral home. The smell and the things he'd seen had stayed with him. He'd barely eaten at the weekend, which was possibly less than the week before. They'd arrived too late to save the patient they'd been dispatched to see, arriving to a grisly scene of charred remains and a devastated family. A stomach had burst with the heat of the fire, showering his face and hair with a mix of blackened flesh and blood. He shuddered, remembering the sticky liquid dripping down his cheeks. He swallowed, and walked into the ED behind Cal.

Connie met them in the staffroom, with her usual disdain for Cal's traditional Monday grogginess. 'Good morning, Doctor Hardy. Doctor Knight, I assume you've rested yourself properly over the weekend. You're down for five days this week.'

'Of course, boss.' Cal said, closing his locker with a bang to show he was awake and ready. It clanged loudly, and the expression on his face as he cringed from the sound showed that he wasn't being entirely truthful.

She ignored him, as usual. 'Doctor Hardy, there's been an incident at the quarry. We have a patient who is trapped under the debris, slowing pulse in the right leg. We need to send a doctor out. There's a crew out there already, but we're sending you with another. Get ready, Dixie's leaving with you in two minutes.'

Connie strode out, her heels tapping against Cal's skull. He rubbed his forehead, leaning against the lockers. 'Rather you than me, Nibbles. That place stinks.'

'You could do with the fresh air. Enjoy changing bedpans.' Ethan knew it was childish, and sighed again, as he pulled on the green uniform his latest assignment called for. 'Right. Less than two minutes. Connie can't complain about that.'

Cal ruffled his hair as Ethan made for the door. 'Good luck, little bro. Enjoy your field trip.'

Rolling his eyes, Ethan managed a smile. They both knew that Ethan was a good doctor to have on site at a incident like this, calm and able to pay attention to the patient, the risks around them, and most importantly; the lives at stake. However, the events of his last call-out were still rather close to the front of his mind, and he swallowed, anticipating the sting of bile in the back of his throat. He met Dixie waiting in the ambulance bay, and jumped into the front seat. Iain was in the back, swiping through another dating app on his phone. He grunted a good morning to Ethan.

'Holby's Prince Charming's feeling a bit down today. Out with your Doctor Knight, weren't you, Iain?' Dixie said, loudly. Iain groaned, as the ambulance swung out of the bay, and Dixie blared the horn at a group of students blocking the way. They scuttled out of the way quickly, and Ethan sat back, amused by the seemingly non-plussed banter between Dixie and Iain, and the speed and urgency with which Dixie easily carved the ambulance through Holby.

'It's the quarry, isn't it?' Ethan asked, pushing his glasses up his nose. 'Patient trapped?'

'Yeah,' Iain checked the computer system, 'Young bloke. Apparently, there's a group down there, some sort of fight. God knows why you'd pick the quarry.'

'Interesting place for history. Arthur and I went a few times.' Ethan went silent for a few seconds, remembering his friend. 'How did the patient get trapped?'

'That place is a mindfield. I'm surprised you'd risk it. Especially with Doctor Digby!' Dixie laughed. 'Seems he's fallen through something. You've got the delight of going to assess.'

A sharp wind blew rain hard against the windscreen, and Ethan didn't look forward to leaving the warmth of the ambulance and heading out into it. 'A real January morning.'

An ambulance, several police cars, and a herd of neon-jacketed quarry workers showed them where to go, before anyone had to direct them. Dixie drove slowly down the slope, the wipers working double-time. 'Get ready, mate. Iain might hold an umbrella for you if you're lucky.' Dixie teased. 'Good luck.'

Ethan got out, the heavy rucksack causing the rain to flick up against his neck. He shivered, and walked over to the paramedics already on the scene. 'He's down there, doctor, with one of our colleagues. He's not in a great shape. Male, mid-twenties. We've not got a name, he's out cold. His mates are having a chat to the police, over there. Nasty lot. Spat at them.'

The paramedic looked annoyed, rightly so, Ethan decided. There was a group of young men, wearing hoodies and jeans, not much protection against the weather, arguing with the local police. He'd come to recognise them after working at the ED for so long. 'How do I get down to him, then?'

'Climb, I'm afraid. It's not far, and there's a ladder. There's usually some sort of metal grid covering it, but this lot of idiots kicked it off, and our man fell in.' The paramedic sighed again, then flashed Iain a tired smile, as the arguments between the police and the group of men grew louder. 'Good luck.'

He'd been told that a lot that morning, he thought, crunching over the uneven stones and looking into the hole in the ground. Someone with a light was at the bottom, and Ethan gulped. Not far down? Clearly he and the paramedic he'd spoken to had very different ideas on that subject. It looked at least ten metres. He felt slightly queasy, and put one foot on it. Solid, at least. More than you could say for the floor in the funeral home. He pushed the thought out of his mind, quickly putting the other foot onto a rung.

The wind was rushing in his ears, and the rain beating down. He could hear the voices of the men arguing, and tried not to look down. He wasn't going as fast as he hoped.

'Let me fucking see him!' A voice shouted from above him, and a foot struck the top of his head. One of the man's friends was trying to get down, having missed Ethan's arrival. Ethan struggled, the impact of the step on his head disorienting him massively. There was a struggle from ahead, as the police tried to pull the man back.

Another kick, this one perhaps intentional. He was fighting now, against the grit clinging to his boots and the cold, wet rain on his fingers. He was fighting to hold on, his fingers buckling.

He knew that he was falling, his head thumping against the bars of the ladder he couldn't hold onto anymore. But he didn't know when he'd stopped.