‘I’m Still Scared’ A Paramedic’s Honest Confession | Lethal Legacy | Casualty

The emergency department was already in chaos when they wheeled her in.

Dr. Linlaker and Dr. Masum took charge immediately, their voices cutting through the noise. “Matty, can you help the patient onto the bed, please?” The young woman on the stretcher was Tahlia — just twenty-two years old. Her face was a mess of blood and fragmented glass. Someone had smashed a pint glass across her features in a vicious attack. The larger pieces had been pulled out at the scene, but tiny, razor-sharp shards still lurked beneath the skin, waiting to be found.

Through the fog of pain and shock, Tahlia’s mind drifted somewhere else entirely. “Sorry — where’s my grandad?” she murmured, disoriented.

“Let’s focus on you for now, OK?” came the gentle but firm reply.

The clinical picture was coming together, and it told a troubling story. She’d had a brief loss of consciousness. Her 12-lead ECG showed sinus tachycardia — her heart hammering too fast, too hard. Respiratory rate: 22. Oxygen saturation: 98 percent on room air. GCS: 15 — she was alert, but barely. Had she blacked out? The doctors clarified: a vasovagal episode, brief and self-correcting. No warning signs beforehand. Blood pressure sitting at 109 over 68. They’d already pushed a gram of IV paracetamol through her veins.

“Thanks, Teddy.”

Then came the question that stopped everyone cold. “What’s her BM?”

Silence.

“You didn’t take her BM? It’s standard to check glucose with a loss of consciousness, right?”

The hesitation said everything. “Yeah, yeah, I know. There was just a lot to deal with. And…”

“And?”

“It was just an oversight. Right, Teddy?”

Teddy swallowed hard. “Yeah. It’s my mistake.”

A beat. Then, quietly: “OK. Could you check her BM, please? Thank you.”

Tahlia’s next question cut through the clinical calm like a blade. “Am I going to lose my eye?”

“We’re going to look after you, OK? We’ll send you for an X-ray. We’ll make sure every last piece of glass has been removed.”

As the team worked, Matty muttered something under his breath. “Paramedics work incredibly hard.”

“Yeah, I know.”

Then the shift took a sharp turn. “Right. Next shout. A pint in The Anchor. Fancy it?”

“I don’t know…”

“Oh, come on, man.”

But before anyone could plan an evening, the radio crackled to life. A general broadcast — all resources needed. An outstanding Category 1 call in the George Avenue area.

“George Avenue?”

“That’s Felix.”

“We can clear that from Holby and respond. Over.”

The scene at George Avenue was already detonating into violence. Felix was on the ground, shouting for everyone to get out. “Where’s the beer?!” Jacob was herding people, his voice a battering ram. “Right, I need everyone out of here, now! Learning how to read and write? Come on, out of here! Move, move!”

Felix — what happened?

“It’s not me. It’s Logan. He’s bleeding.”

A line needed to go in, fast. “OK, let’s get a line in.”

From somewhere in the dark, a voice roared: “Chuck another one!”

And then the fireworks came — not celebration, but weaponry. Explosions ripped through the air, jarring and savage, turning the street into a war zone.

“Matty, could you get a better line in, please? Thanks, guys.”

“Is there a problem with that one?”

“Well, it’s a small cannula. It just sometimes makes our jobs a bit more difficult.”

“Your jobs a bit more difficult?” The disbelief was acid. “We’ve just had bricks thrown at us through a window.”

Bricks. Fireworks. Glass in a young woman’s face. A missing grandad. A missed blood glucose reading. Colleagues covering for each other. A night out that would never happen. And somewhere out there, still bleeding, still waiting — Logan.

The night was far from over. It was just getting started.