The glass doors of Grey Sloan—still Seattle Grace, Christopher reminded himself—hissed open, and the atmosphere hit him like a physical wall of whispers. It was 6:00 AM, the hour of the tired and the caffeinated, yet the hospital grapevine was already in full bloom.
As he walked toward the elevators, he saw them. The "intern huddle" near the nurse's station. Izzie Stevens looked like she'd just seen a ghost, and George O'Malley was staring at Christopher with a mixture of terror and hero worship.
"Is it true?" George squeaked, his voice cracking. "Meredith said you... you performed a thoracostomy in a dive bar? With a steak knife and a cocktail straw?"
Christopher didn't slow his stride. He stepped into the elevator, and the interns scrambled in after him, trapped in the small steel box.
"Technically, George, it was a jumbo smoothie straw," Christopher said, his voice as dry as a desert bone. "The cocktail straws have a diameter too small for adequate tension release. I'm a surgeon, not a miracle worker. I require at least a basic understanding of fluid dynamics from my cutlery."
Izzie's eyes were wide. "But the infection risk! A steak knife? Was it even serrated?"
Christopher leaned back against the elevator wall, crossing his arms. He looked at her with a slow, pitying smile. "It was the house special, Stevens. Medium-rare. And yes, it was serrated. It made the intercostal incision much more... texturesque. If you're worried about the infection, don't be. I doused it in cheap vodka. It's basically what they use in the ICU anyway, just with more personality."
"You could have killed him," Alex Karev muttered from the back, though even he sounded impressed.
"And you could have been useful if you were there, Karev, but I suspect you would have just stared at the pool table and wondered if you could bill the guy for a consult," Christopher retorted.
The elevator dinged. Christopher stepped out, leaving the interns blinking in his wake. He felt the familiar, dark satisfaction of his own sharp tongue. He knew the "Steak-Knife Surgeon" nickname would stick for months. In the original timeline, this kind of lore belonged to the legends. Now, it belonged to him.
He was heading toward the ICU to check on his "patient" when he saw Cristina Yang leaning against the wall, a chart in her hand and a predatory glint in her eye.
"A steak knife, Wright?" she asked, her voice low. "Impressive. Most people just call emergency services and pray. You went full MacGyver."
"I was hungry, Cristina. The man interrupted my scotch," Christopher said, not missing a beat. "I considered using a fork, but the ergonomics were all wrong."
"And the guy you were with?" Cristina's eyes sharpened. "The one in the five-thousand-dollar suit who Meredith said looked like he wanted to either sue you or marry you?"
Christopher felt a flare of heat in his chest—a localized inflammation of his privacy. "He was a witness, Yang. Something you'd be if you spent more time looking at patients and less time looking at my dating life."
He walked past her, his mind already drifting to the business card in his pocket. Jack. The lawyer who liked "complicated cases."
Christopher checked the patient's chart. The man was stable, his lungs expanding beautifully. A clean save.
He pulled his phone out and sent a quick text: "The hospital thinks I'm a folk hero. My interns think I'm a psychopath. I think I'm just ready for that dinner. No knives allowed."
He hit send and looked at the clock. Twelve hours until his shift ended. Twelve hours of dodging the Chief, avoiding Derek's suspicious glares, and pretending he didn't know exactly which bus was going to hit which character next.