Luka is ending his long shift and is on his way up to see how Bishop Stewart is doing.  Abby catches him and asks him if he will be heading home soon.  He tells her that he doesn’t know.  Luka speaks with the bishop and tells him that he will have to be put on a ventilator soon.  The bishop tells him thanks, but no thanks.  He replies that his bags are packed, referring to him being ready to die.

Seven hours earlier:

Mark is on his way out after his shift ends.  He has his last competency testing that day.  A new Pediatric intern named Rena is with a young boy who has ingested some oil lamp.  The boy’s name is Jason and he is afraid of having an IV put in.  Carter goes to assist her and to admit the boy.  Peter is in surgery and med. school “wannabe” William White is watching on.  Peter asks him how he will answer an interview question and William is unsure of how to answer it correctly.  Abby comes in to get Carter.  A commuter train has derailed and his assistance is needed at the scene.  

Carter and Luka go by helicopter to the accident site.  Luka runs to check on the young woman whose car was on the track to cause the accident.  Her name is Shannon and she is not badly hurt.  He then heads to the inside of the train to help.  He sees a woman who wants him to find her son.  His name is Miles and he was on the way to the restroom when the accident occurred.  He asks her why she has not left the train and he sees that she can not move because she has something impaled into her body.  He goes to search for Miles.  When he sees the boy trapped in the ruble, he flashes back to his son being trapped and dead in the ruble.  Another helicopter arrives at the scene.  Elizabeth Corday is on it and she is being brought in to help with a firefighter that is pinned under the wreckage.  On the way to assist the man, she takes a fall.  She seems to be okay, so she gets up and goes to the man.  Back at the ER, Kerry is getting everyone situated.  Peter comes down to assist as the surgeon.  William White is right behind him and in the way.  Back at the accident scene, Carter assists Corday.  She is going to have to amputate both of his legs.  Mark is taking a test that involves cards with arrows on them.  He does not seem to be doing very well with the test.  Elizabeth is having contractions and cannot continue working on the man.  She has to get back on the helicopter and head back to the ER.  Luka has been able to get to Miles and he puts him on the helicopter to the ER.  Carter has to finish what Elizabeth started.  He calls Peter for help.  Carter has a hard time with hearing him because of the loud noise from the news helicopters and the sirens.  Elizabeth arrives at the ER and Abby asks her if she remembers the last time she felt the baby move.  Elizabeth can not remember because it has been awhile.  Peter works on Miles and has to speak with Carter over the phone at the same time.  William White watches as Peter cuts into Miles’ skull.  Miles begins to seize and Peter has to put the phone down and take the boy up to the OR.  Luka is taking care of the boy’s mother.  Mark comes in to check on Elizabeth.  Kerry speaks with Shannon,  the young woman who caused the accident.  She tells her that she thought it would have been a painless way to die.  She was trying to commit suicide.  Kim comes down to check the girl out and she tells Kerry to wake her when she comes home later that night.  Thirty-seven patients were brought in to the ER and only two of them died.  Randi tells Luka that the mom and her son Miles are doing well.  William White tells Peter that he doesn’t think that he can handle something like this.  He is unsure if he even wants to go to med. school now.  He has never seen anything like it before.  Peter tells him to go to the interview.  Elizabeth is told that she will need bed rest until time for the baby to be born.  It is now 11:30 p.m. and we are back to where the episode began.  Luka is with the bishop.  He tells Luka that is he wants to do his confession he will need to do it soon.  He wants to take Luka’s burden with him when he dies.  Luka tells him how he lost his family back in Croatia.  After the town is bombed, Luka arrives to the building where his family is.  As he climbs the stairs, he passes several injured people begging for his help.  He arrives at his apartment and his wife Danijela is screaming for their son Marco.  Luka sees the boy under the ruble and he is dead.  He sees that his daughter is not breathing and begins to start CPR on her.  His wife is bleeding to death, but he is not able to leave his daughter to help his wife.  He loses his whole family.  He prayed for somebody to come and help them, but nobody came.  The bishop says a prayer and absolves Luka of all of his sins.  The bishop later dies.         

Reviewed by Tony Conner on 02-23-2001