Dr. Carter struggles with his drug dependency; a custodial strike leaves the ER cluttered with garbage; a riot at a high-school football game leaves several wounded.

Weaver becomes concerned about Greene's cognitive skills and surreptitiously calls for an official evaluation of his competency. Corday plans her wedding to Greene. Bishop Stewart returns, and Kovacs realizes the man has a terrible disease. Dateless for a charity function, Carter invites Abby to attend with him.

Abby and Carter travel to Oklahoma to rescue Abby's mentally ill mother and bring her back to Chicago. In Chicago, Maggie suffers from a sleeping pills overdose. At County General, Kovac frantically revives her. Benton treats a college student injured in a fraternity prank.

Abby helps a distraught boy whose mother died of a stroke; a man with schizophrenia, who once stabbed Carter and killed a doctor checks into the ER.

Confident second-year resident Pratt wants to prove his abilities when he works the graveyard shift (11 p.m. to 7 a.m.), but his heroics sometimes backfire. Pratt shows contempt for a man, Ed Gamble, who presents no symptoms of disease but temporarily loses his speech.