"Yes," Rojas confirmed. "Surgical ICU. Continuous ICP monitoring if we bolt her. Neuro checks every hour. Labs every two."
They moved around the bed in practiced choreography—adjusting drips, recalibrating monitors, speaking in clipped shorthand I understood perfectly: GCS 8, possible evolving DIC, high ARDS risk.
Glasgow Coma Scale of eight—deep coma. Disseminated intravascular coagulation—her blood could start clotting inside vessels and bleeding everywhere else. Acute respiratory distress—lungs filling with fluid, drowning her from the inside.
I knew every grim statistic. Every mortality curve.
And it was all useless.
Rojas peeled off her gloves with a sharp snap, stepping back to survey the quiet battlefield. "We've done everything we can right now. We stabilize. We watch. We intervene the second anything shifts." Her dark eyes found mine, steady and unflinching. "The rest is up to her. Her body has to choose whether it still wants to fight."
