Medical Center. Operating Room 3.
Adam and little Melendez were operating on the one-year-old baby boy.
"Poor kid," Adam said, shaking his head as he looked at the tiny figure on the table. He held out his hand. "Scalpel!"
The nurse handed it over right away.
Surgery began.
This baby was already messed up—passive meth addiction had wrecked his nerves, heart, and kidneys. Now they were cutting him open. Talk about stacking debuffs. Most people get a head start in life; this little guy not only lost at the starting line but had his parents dig a pit and bury him in it. His future was going to be rough, no question.
Dr. Shepherd finished his surgery and came over with Lexie and the others.
"How's it going?" he asked.
"Everything's smooth so far," Adam said, glancing up. "How about you guys?"
"Surgery went fine," Shepherd replied, stepping up to the table to observe.
"Little Grey, go take care of the kid's mom," Adam said, nodding at Lexie.
"Yes, Dr. Duncan," Lexie replied quickly.
Meredith, standing nearby, kept her eyes down, acting like she hadn't heard a thing.
By the time the surgery wrapped up, it was noon.
Cafeteria.
"George, come on over!" Meredith called out, waving as she saw him standing there with his tray, looking torn.
"Nah," George said. He glanced at Adam, then at Lexie, Melendez, and Carter at another table. After a long internal debate, he finally headed over to join Lexie's group.
"Looks like you've really got him under control," Cristina teased.
"Poor George," Meredith sighed. "Adam, don't be too hard on him. He's our friend."
"I'm not being hard on him. It's his choice," Adam said with a laugh. "He's an intern now—hanging out with his colleagues and competitors is the smart move. Haven't you heard the saying? Keep your friends close, and your enemies closer. George isn't the top dog among those four interns. Recognizing where he stands is a good thing. Or did you forget that whole mess with him and Dr. Burke?"
"…"
Meredith didn't have a comeback.
Back when George was a newbie, he got chewed out by Burke as a warning to the others because he had zero situational awareness. Day one, he was clumsy and slow, and when Burke called him out, George had the nerve to snap back—right in front of a patient—saying something snarky like, "Bet you were like this when you were an intern too." Later, after spending more time together and bonding a bit through Cristina, Burke warmed up to him slightly.
And then George got cocky. He started chatting with Burke about his relationship with Cristina, acting like he was there to solve the guy's problems. Burke's face dropped instantly.
There's an old saying: Get too close, and they disrespect you; stay too far, and they resent you. It fit "pretty boy" George to a T.
Adam figured George couldn't gauge his own limits naturally—he needed external cues to see where he stood. Otherwise, he'd float right back into that clueless, boundary-free zone. In regular life or some other job, that might not matter. But in a hospital? No way.
The strict hierarchy here exists for a reason: efficiency in saving lives. If people start ignoring rank and causing chaos, the consequences are too big.
"Cristina, how's your patient doing?" Adam asked, shifting to the junkie case.
"Eh, same old," Cristina said with a shrug. "While you guys were in surgery, he coded twice more. I brought him back both times. Big 30-something guy, crying his eyes out the whole time. Kept saying he wasn't always a junkie. Said it started after he turned 30, went to some party. The air was thick with meth fumes, everyone around him looked like they were having the time of their lives. He thought, What's the big deal? One try won't kill me.
"Then came the second time. After that, it was all he could think about. Next thing he knew, he was camped out at the dealer's door at 5 a.m., ready to buy. Now he's in the hospital, heart stopping every other minute. When the cravings hit, he's shaking, scratching, bawling about how stupid he was, saying this isn't him, he shouldn't have ended up like this. Then he gets worked up, the monitor freaks out, heart stops again, and I've got to jump in and save him. Again."
Emmm.
Talk about the ultimate environmental contagion.
"Getting on your nerves?" Adam asked casually. "Hand him over to me—I'll take him off your hands."
"You?" Cristina blinked, surprised. "For real?"
"I want to hear his story," Adam said, covering his real motive.
He couldn't exactly admit he was intrigued by a case that might let him "farm lifespan," right?
"Fine by me," Cristina said, piecing it together with his writer background. She jumped at the chance before he could back out. "Deal! He's all yours—I'm done with him!"
"No problem," Adam said, nodding with a smile.
He was curious to see if this could actually work for stretching out lifespans.
"What about that neighbor?" Adam asked, shifting gears.
"Callie's handling him," Cristina said, sounding a little disappointed. "Burns, fracture—nothing major."
"He's innocent—a real pity," Meredith piped up. "Sixty years old, all alone, thought his neighbors were like family. He'd watch their kid all the time. Even after the explosion hit him too, when he got to the hospital, he didn't care about his own injuries—just kept asking about his 'family' next door."
"Turns out he saw them as family, but they just saw him as a free babysitter," Cristina said with a scoff. "Every week on their little meth-cooking day, they'd dump the kid on him so they could focus on their 'career.'"
"You can't really blame him," Adam said, shaking his head. "Not just a lonely old guy—even regular people wouldn't hand their kid over to someone unless they felt close, right? The parents doing that would make anyone think it's a sign of trust, like being 'family.' Isn't that how it works?"
Anyone who knows a thing about the dark side of American TV dramas gets why you've got to protect kids from everyone—neighbors, coworkers, acquaintances, relatives, friends, even family…
Take The Big Bang Theory. Penny meets Leonard and Sheldon on day one and waltzes into their apartment to shower, asking Leonard to bring her a towel. Day two, she hands him her spare key. Either Penny's a total pro, fearless of any shady scenario, or it's wild.
Otherwise, the towel thing—or Sheldon using that key to sneak into her place at night while she's snoring, tidying up her apartment, with Leonard joining in—stops being a quirky comedy. It's either an action flick or a horror movie. Most likely both—an action-horror hybrid.
Or maybe an action-comedy. Picture Leonard and Sheldon actually being evil, but total weaklings. Penny, with those massive hands Sheldon always rags on and Leonard backs up, unleashes some kung-fu-style grapple move. She grabs them—one in each hand—hoisting a pathetic Sheldon and an overstimulated Leonard, who's wheezing through his asthma inhaler while grinning like a creep. With a wicked laugh, she drags them back to her bedroom and tosses them on the bed…
(End of Chapter)