Brian Lester

Benton and Corday go on a date to play darts. Carter must make a tough decision when he works to save the life of a serial rapist. Hathaway helps Weaver deliver a mentally challenged couple's baby, that might be taken away by relatives.

Corday refuses to testify against Romano after he threatens Benton's career. A harried Anspaugh accepts Romano's offer to serve as acting chief. Greene befriends a Nigerian hospital worker, Mobalage (Djimon Hounsou), who suffers from back pain. Because she was adopted, Weaver decides to search for her real parents. Ross forges papers through Hathaway's clinic in order to get equipment so that Joi Abbott can treat her dying son at home.

On a busy Fourth of July weekend, Carter oversees an understaffed hospital that is flooded with patients. An HIV-positive biker remains brain dead as the result of a robbery, and his girlfriend wants to donate one of his organs to his friend, who is also infected with HIV. After several surgeons refuse, Carter persuades Corday to perform the organ transplant. Meanwhile, Ray is upset with Abby because she bypassed his orders and requested a drug test on his patient, a bicycle messenger. Abby later asks Carter to dinner in hopes of talking to him about his past problems. Pratt performs below his normal capabilities when he returns to work too early after having a craniotomy--a type of brain surgery in which the doctor removes part of the bone from the skull to get to the brain.

After 10 years at Chicago's County General Hospital, Attending Physician Dr. John Carter (series star Noah Wyle) has risen to a role of respect and moral leadership in the emergency room. His recently graduated colleague Abby Lockhart (series star Maura Tierney) proudly dons a doctor's white lab coat for the first time. Newly promoted to chief of staff, Dr. Kerry Weaver (series star Laura Innes) remains as tough as ever, but chinks have appeared in her armor, especially after the loss of her life partner and the resulting bitter custody battle over their son. Attending Physician Dr. Luka Kovac (series star Goran Visnjic) carries on a complicated romance with streetwise, seasoned nurse Samantha Taggart (series star Linda Cardellini), whose 10-year-old son, Alex (recurring guest star Oliver Davis), looks up to Kovac as a role model, friend and, sometimes, substitute father.

Two small children are rushed to the emergency room after falling out of a third-floor window. The medical staff believes an abusive father is responsible for the tragedy, but the truth is later revealed. While treating a man who complains of an unsightly rash, Pratt diagnoses the real problem--the patient has lung cancer. Corday is disciplined by hospital administrators for ignoring proper protocol when she performed an organ transplant on an HIV-positive patient. Instead of being terminated, Corday is offered a position that will not lead to tenure. Sam contemplates moving in with Kovac. Neela decides to leave her job at the mini-mart after Lewis, newly promoted to chief of emergency medicine, offers her a position at the hospital.