Title: Every Street
Author: Triggersaurus
triggersaurus@hotmail.com 
Rating: PG-13 (I used a bit of bad language - slapped wrists!)
Spoilers: The Storm Part Two
Genre: Doug, some Carol but not much, thriller, non-ER
Disclaimer: Please Santa, I want the rights to ER for Christmas.
Summary: Facilis descensus Averno - the descent to hell is easy
Thanks:  Huge great big hug and thank you to Ryan for checking for
British/American translations and practically doing all my research for me
(God bless AFGM!).
Inspiration note:  This story was entirely inspired by two songs by Dire
Straits - Private Investigations and On Every Street.  The lyrics are
reproduced at the end if you want to read them - thanks Mr. Knopfler for the
loan, I'll bring 'em back soon, I promise!
PLEASE READ - General note: Forget everything that happened post-The Storm.
This isn't trying to be a fic about ER - it's trying to be my break into
fiction, as opposed to fanfiction.  But I'm a bit of a wimp, so I stole the
characters I already knew so I didn't have to make up my own - cue cheesy
grin.  All I can say is, bear with me and I hope you like it.

Prologue

The area was far from the image in his mind that he'd prayed would be a
reality.  The streets were dark.  The buildings were dark and tall, those
that were inhabited, if that's what you'd call it, were damp and echoed with
lost voices.  Those that weren't inhabited emanated the smell of fear
through the cracks in walls and around the edges of the boards that were
tacked over the windows.  Billposters littered the boards, advertising new
movies in a district that had no cinema, nightclubs in an area that provided
all its own late night attractions.  Whiskey bottles in brown paper bags
littered the streets, and although humanity was not unseen it felt like a
ghost town, struck by some late-nineties depression specific to these five
blocks.

He stood on the spot, the tarmac that was potholed and due for resurfacing
and bordered by a kerbstone loose in its place, which long before had been
marked with chalk.  He crouched down and rubbed the place on the road where
he could have sworn he'd seen flecks of white dust, and a tinge of deep red.
But it was just the lights of the nearby bar - the neon sign flashing
"Budweiser" inanely to no one in particular and reflecting off the wet
street.  The heavy Chicago rain that had soaked the area that morning and
had continued to pound off the concrete wilderness all day and into the
night, now beat down hard on Doug's back, shoulders and head as he stood up
and tipped his head back.  Looking up into the sky, he let the hard water
smack on his closed eyelids and wash away the image of the seedy bar, the
trash lying on the sidewalk, the black Mercedes.  He hoped that the cold
wind would blow away the sounds of screeching brakes in the distance, and
the whispers of silence that haunted the region in his mind that would
withhold the fear and sorrow for the remainder of his life.


I

"I swear by Apollo the physician, to hold my teacher in this art equal to my
own parents, to consider his family as my own brothers and to teach them
this art without payment.  I will use my best judgement to help the sick and
do no harm.  I will not give fatal drugs to anyone - even if I am asked.
Nor will I ever suggest any such thing.  I will not give a woman any
medication to cause abortion.  I will be chaste and religious in my life and
in my practice.  I will not use the knife, even to remove the stones within.
I will not abuse my authority to indulge in sexual contact.  I will never
divulge the secrets of my patients, regarding them as holy."  Hippocratic
Oath

"The preservation of health is a duty. Few seem conscious that there is such
a thing as physical morality." Herbert Spencer, Education

It was a move that he regretted for the rest of his life, but at the same
time his principles dictated that what he had done was still right.
Previously, he didn't think he really had an opinion about euthanasia - the
suffering for the patient was bad, but on the other hand, as he had said
once before, if it was your kid you'd bet on a miracle.  So that you could
cheat fate and stay with them for one more day.  It was an opinion that hit
home hard now, smacking into every red raw nerve.  But back then, his mind
wasn't in that frameset and all he wanted was to ease the pain of Ricky and
his family.  He didn't intend to take it as far as he did to begin with, but
one thing lead to another as these things often do, and before he really
knew what he'd done his young patient was cold in his bed and his relations
with his colleagues and employers had frozen over.  When he offered to
resign, and tried in vain to persuade her to come with him to a better place
where they could escape the inevitable backlash of his crime, he knew that's
all it was - he was running away, tail between his legs.  He was going to
try and forget about it, pretend it had never happened and work on building
a happy little family, with a big house and white picket fence.  Except it
wouldn't let him forget.



"All rise"

The courtroom echoed as the sparse crowd scraped their chairs back and stood
up.  Doug rose from behind the solid oak desk in front of him and smoothed
down his suit jacket, crumpled from where he'd been unconsciously wringing
his hands on his lap.  Behind him sat Mark and Carol, with Donald Anspaugh
and Neil Bernstein further to the left.  Whilst they had all accepted that
Doug had an aversion towards hospital policies and rulebooks, none of them
had ever thought they'd seen him facing such serious charges in a court of
law.  And none of them wanted to be seeing it either.  Despite the ructions
from within, the staff of County Hospital now had to stand by this attending
physician, as he stood against the world to face what he had done, what he
had let happen.

"His Honor Justice Henry Lomak presiding"

The court official fell quiet again as the judge unceremoniously eased into
his chair.  He wasn't a small man and he filled the leather bound chair more
than satisfactorily. A stack of papers lay on the bench before him and he
leaned forward and took the top one, peering down at it over the top of his
half moon glasses.

"United States versus Ross?"

"Yes, Your Honor"

"Are counsel ready?"

The state attorney leapt from his seat.  "Yes, Your Honor, the prosecution
is ready"

Judge Lomak looked at this display of eagerness and turned his head ever so
slowly to the table at which Doug and his singular defense lawyer sat.

"Yes, Your Honor."

The fact that Doug had resigned his position at the hospital before the
charges were brought against him meant that he couldn't accept one of
County's lawyers from Risk Management.  Instead, he'd had a long and painful
search for one, just him and the Yellow Pages.  As a result of this and his
sudden lack of income, he sat next to a man named Clifton DeVann who had had
three attempts at the bar exam before passing and was now a recovering
alcoholic.  Thank god the man had at least one suit that made him look a bit
more like a lawyer and less like a bum.  This was all in stark comparison to
the prosecuting tag team.  It seemed like there weren't enough seats at that
table for them all.  The Armani and Hugo Boss radiated off them, and an IBM
laptop decorated the otherwise sparse oak surface.  Doug glanced at his own
table, strewn with papers and legal pads covered in what he presumed was
writing, although for all he knew it could have been one of his patients'
scribblings.  He was jerked out of this depressing line of thought by the
booming voice of Dan Sullivan, the over-eager state attorney.

"You Honor, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, today we will establish beyond
any reasonable doubt that this man here, Dr. Douglas Ross, did commit
reckless homicide on 16th February 1998, resulting in the death of Richard
Adam Abbott, a patient at County General Hospital under treatment for
Adrenal Leukodystrophy.
This case will raise many moral questions and implications, and indeed, the
defense will try to argue for the case of "mercy killing".  But let it be
noted that nowhere in the law of any country in the world is any form of
killing sanctioned, whether it be out of cold blood or pity.  Richard
Abbott, although suffering from a fatal disease, could have lived for at
least another day.  And you may say, "Well, what's another day?" but to his
family, one more day meant much more than can be put into words.
With the aid of expert witnesses, we will prove that Dr. Ross acted
unlawfully in assisting the death of this young boy, despite his image of a
caring emergency room pediatrician."

Counselor Sullivan dropped back into his seat, with a satisfied smirk
playing on his lips, noticeable only to those few who were looking for it.
Doug, carefully studying his shoes, shifted uncomfortably in his seat.  He
was so angry that he had no way of expressing it.  Somehow this was worse
than any other anger he had ever felt - any time Mark had pulled rank, the
time Carol had run to the fireman, the countless kids who came in abused and
wouldn't talk about it, even the contempt he felt for his father, it was all
outweighed by his anger at what he was being accused of and the portrait
that the slimy state lawyers were painting of him.  The fact that he had to
stand up and try to prove himself to these strangers in an unfamiliar
setting.  The fact that the democratic policy of innocence until proven
guilty had been turned on its head and everyone was looking at him, eyes
burning through him, saying 'we trusted you', and on top of everything else
he knew he'd done the right thing but the goddamned law couldn't accept it.
"...and we are confident that the prosecution will not be able to prove
beyond reasonable doubt that the defendant is guilty."

DeVann thumped back into his seat beside his client and looked at him.
"You okay?"

"Sure.  Just fine."


~~~More to come~~~