13.01

"You heard?" Helena asked, as Meredith joined her in quickly walking down to the ER. As the brunette woman was working the night shift, the blond had been at home. "About Andrew?"

"Yes. Jo called me." The general surgeon nodded, a serious look on her face. "Her apartment floor was full of blood. I-I think Alex did something, Lena."

At that, Helena's look only intensified, as she started a run towards one of the trauma rooms.

As she entered it, she found the bloody resident on the bed. His face was swollen and covered in blood, his left arm bent at an unnatural angle. As Ben Warren reduced his septum into place, a loud crack echoed through the room , making Helena shut her eyes, with a shaky breath. Receiving traumas for any patient was one thing, seeing your friend in such a bad state was another one entirely.

As she felt Meredith catch up to her, enterro g the room, Helena opened her eyes, choosing to focus on Alex, instead of on Andrew.

"Alex. May we speak to you for a moment?" Meredith let out, trying to keep her composure.

"We ready to go?" Alex asked, holding the resident's head.

"Alex?" The woman repeated.

"Alright, let's go." The ortho attending encouraged.

"Alexander Karev!" Helena snapped, her voice between a whisper and a yell. "."

"I've got this." Looking towards the women, Ben nodded to the other man, as the trio left the room.

As Alex walked out of the door, Helena's eyes darted to his bruised and bloody right hand, making her shake her head almost imperceptibly, as she leaned against the hallway wall.

"Say something." Meredith requested, standing in the middle of the small hallway, with the man in front of her.

"What do you want me to say...?" The man shrugged.

"You think no one is gonna realize this is you? Look at that hand!" Meredith reprimanded in a hushed tone, as Helena simply glared at him. "You could go to jail! This is assault! I am a doctor. I have a duty to report you to Bailey."

At that, Alex looked down, pleading. "Mer, come on. You're gonna turn me into Bailey...?"

Meredith seemed to think for a moment, before deciding, as she walked away. "No. I'm not. But you better find a way to fix this."

As she left, Alex turned to Helena, who now looked at the ground, still shaking her head. "Lena. Lena, come on. Say something." There was simply silence silence, as Helena shook her head. "I didn't... look, he came home. He was on top of her. She was drunk. He was... he..."

"No." Helena interrupted, looking up. "Don't... you can't tell me anything. Because if I don't know anything, I have nothing to report. I-I only have... suspicions, and suspicions don't have to be reported." The shorter woman looked down to his hand, before coming up with a plausible explanation. "What you- when I noticed your hand, you told me you slipped in the rain. That's how you hurt your hand. And that's all I know. Got it?"

Alex nodded slowly, in understanding. Then, in gratitude, he almost whispered. "Thank you."

"Don't thank me. Look at him, Alex. This is... this is not..." The girl simply shook her head in disappointment, giving up on finding the right words as she left.

——

As Ben worked on the boy's eye, in the ICU,Helena stood at the entrance of Andrew's room, leaning against the door frame, her arms crossed.

As Maggie walked into the room, she asked. "Hi. I'm here. Has he been conscious?"

"He was on intake, but we had to tube him." Ben explained, as he worked on the boy's eye.

"His head CT is clear, but he does have an eight-ball hyphema." Jackson added, as the cardio surgeon moved to hold her ex boyfriend's hand.

"Who did this?" Maggie asked, horror across her face, making Helena bite the inside of her cheek.

"I don't know. Karev brought him in, but we still haven't heard what happened." The plastics surgeon shrugged, bandaging the nose. "Actually, we should find out who we need to call. I'm gonna go grab his personnel file."

"His mother. We should call his mother. She's probably at work, by now. She works a lot of night shifts." Helena let out, making the doctors look to her, questioningly. With a sad shrug, she explained. "He's my mentee. We spend a lot of time together."

"I'll call her." Maggie offered. "She knows me."

With a nod, Helena took one last look at the boy, preparing to leave. His face was still bloody, his face intubated and his left eye swollen shut. The exact same eye George O'Malley had been unable to open, almost a decade before.

Taking a deep breath, she left the room.

——

The OR gallery always seemed colder when it was empty, Helena noted, wrapping her arms around her body in search for some warmth. As Meredith walked in, she glanced at Andrew on the surgical table, before seating by person.

"How is he?" The blond asked.

"He's got a grade four hyphema." The brunette told her, in a long sigh. "Jackson's trying to drain it now."

"But?"

"But he must be worried about rebleeds. Possibly long term vision loss." Helena shrugged. "I would be."

"Which would mean...?" Meredith asked. Although she knew the answer, she was hoping to be wrong.

"That the person that did this to him might have just ended Andrew's career as a surgeon." The shorter doctor nodded, bringing up her heels to the chair and hugging her knees. Even as she discussed the situation, she avoided saying it was Alex, almost in denial. "I don't know what happened in that room, Mer. I don't. But Andrew's... I know . He's a good guy. And, yes, sometimes you think you know someone and then don't, so I don't want to jump to conclusions or... I don't even know what to think. Because I get that if Alex thought that Andrew was hurting Jo, he'd try to protect her, but this...? This is not... it's not a punch to get him to back off. It's almost beating him to death." Helena ran her hands up her face. "God, I'm so mad at him."

"I know. But Alex is... you know, he's . He's impulsive. He probably didn't even fully realize what he was doing until he was done." Meredith tried.

"I he didn't. I know he wouldn't actually hurt anyone this bad if he was thinking clearly. That doesn't make this right." Helena mumbled, shaking her head slightly.