season 5 episode 6
George walked down the hall towards the resident's lounge as Holly walked down another across his. Once he saw the redhead, he smiled, "Hey, Holly, would you mind pick--" She kept her head forward and refused to look at him as she passed him, "Holly, I'm your boyfriend." He reminded, "You're eventually gonna have to talk to me."
She turned around to face him, "I reject that supposition."
George turned around as he stood by the door for the lounge, "I reject your rejection."
"Then, I ignore your rejections."
George frowned his eyebrows, "What?"
Cristina and Meredith walked into the resident's lounge as Meredith shrugged, having heard the conversation, "I don't reject you, George."
George nodded at her, "Thank you."
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Holly tied the back of Lexie's yellow scrub coat as the new intern asked Cristina, "Dr. Yang, what exactly happens in a skills lab?"
She turned around and frowned her eyebrows, "Who are you?"
"I'm your new intern." He greeted, "Ryan Spalding."
"Oh," She softly groaned, "I'm never gonna remember that. You're, um," She turned around to check her residents, "uh, 5." She checked outside the door, and at seeing Dr. Hunt-- the 'super-hot' army guy that kissed her after he removed an icicle that impaled her-- ran over to Holly and Lexie, placing their bodies in front of her as a shield, "Three, Four, move."
"What?" Holly questioned as she tied her hair up.
Lexie turned her head at her resident, "Is everything okay?"
"Shut up." Cristina advised, "Don't move."
"Hi," Dr. Hunt entered the room, "I'm Dr. Hunt. Over the next few months, I will be teaching you how to work quickly and efficiently to keep someone alive in circumstances where the safe bet is they're dead by the end of the hour. Now does anyone have a problem working with live tissue?"
Holly frowned her eyebrows and whispered to Lexie, "'Live tissue?'"
Lexie shrugged as Dr. Hunt continued, "Anyone? Speak now. In fact, leave now. If not, I own you for the rest of the day." No one moved, "Good." He grabbed the curtain that was blocking their view and brought it back, "Here we go."
Holly looked at the pigs tied up upside-down to the table with confusion swirling in her eyes-- she thought it was going to be a regular skills lab with dummies.
"Each resident gets a pig. Interns assist." Steve tried to move forward but Owen put out a hand, "Hang on." He removed a switchblade from his pocket and began to stab the pigs-- emitting gasps from interns and residents alike as they flinched at each stab, "Go ahead." He advised once he finished, "Save their lives."
There was a brief pause before Izzie spoke up, "You're a monster."
"They're under." Dr. Hunt explained as he put back the switchblade, "They didn't feel any pain. Ask the veterinarian."
"You stabbed them."
"So we can save them." Cristina chimed in, stepping out of Holly and Lexie's shadow.
"We can practice o-- on surgical mannequins." Izzie scoffed, "We can learn to do the exact same stuff."
"Does this mean you're out?" Dr. Hunt asked, walking forward as if he was challenging Izzie.
"Yeah," Izzie sassed, as she began to walk away, "I'm out."
"In that case," Dr. Hunt looked behind him before glancing back at the interns and residents, "who wants two pigs?"
Holly, along with the other interns from her group and Alex's, raised their hands.
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As Dr. Hunt checked on the other pigs, Holly assisted Dr. Yang while petting the pig as Steve and Ryan worked on the other pig with Lexie petting theirs.
Cristina brought her head up slowly and did a double take at the two, "Are you two petting the pig?"
Holly brought her hand up, "No."
Lexie stuttered, "I-I was--"
"Stop petting the pig." Cristina reprimanded.
"You seem to be spending a lot of time on that anastomosis." Dr. Hunt pointed out as he reached their group, "What was your name again?"
"Yang." Cristina reminded, not believing he forgot her name after he made out with her, "Cristina Yang."
"Right." He nodded, "Come take a look at this guy's pig."
Cristina turned her head around and questioned, "O'Malley?"
Holly continued to suction for the anastomosis as Cristina went away and looked at Lexie, "I bet if I told him I took this as a competition, he'd forfeit the game like he did last night."
"It was two games, Holly." Lexie reasoned, "He was just--"
"I'd rather win fair-and-square." Holly huffed, "I don't want a petty win."
✧
There had been an M.V.C. trauma coming into the E.R., which caused Dr. Hunt to take away Alex and George, along with their interns, from the skills lab and left Cristina with all the four pigs-- and her interns.
Holly helped close the incision of one of the pigs as Lexie turned around, "Ryan, what's Reggie's pulse?"
"Sixty-nine." Ryan answered after looking at the monitor.
Holly sighed, "Really? Wilbur's at 102, and I'm starting to think that's bad."
"Babe's like an ox." Steve smiled as he turned around, "Hers is fifty-two."
"Hey," Cristina reprimanded, "no cute names. They're not pets. They're subjects. It's not our job to get all affectionate. It's our job to keep them alive..." She muttered, "so the attending who somehow thinks we're incapable can choke on his words at the end of the day." Cristina raised her volume to normal, "So I don't want to hear Wilbur or Babe. You want to call them something, call them sausage or prosciutto."
"At my dad's farm," Holly commented, "we used to name the pigs."
Cristina looked up at the redhead, "And then you slaughtered them."
Holly shrugged, "Fair point."
The monitor began to beep erratically and Lexie spoke, "Wilbur's crashing."
"Crap."
"What?" Cristina ran over to the two, "What did you do?'
"I don't--" Lexie stammered, "I don't--"
"I gotta reopen that thoracotomy. Uh," She pointed at Ryan, "pull that chest tray back over here."
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"Give me the status on Reggie and Paddy." Cristina said as she performed surgery on Wilbur with Lexie and Holly.
"Reggie's fine." Ryan answered, looking at the monitors, "Paddy's pulse ox is low but stable."
"And Babe?"
"Holding steady." Steve assured, "I thought we weren't supposed to give them names."
Cristina shook her head, "I could give them numbers, but then I'd probably tell you Three needs antibiotics and find you shoving a needle in Grey's ass." Lexie turned around to look at Steve, "His vitals are getting worse. Damn it."
"Um," Holly hummed, "did you check his lung again?"
"I already took out an entire lobe." Cristina sighed.
"What about his descending aorta?" Lexie suggested.
"Can it." Cristina stared back at the open cavity, "I've tried everything." The monitor began to beep erratically again, "Pulseless. Uh, that's it." She shook her head, "We need to get more exposure."
Holly looked up at her resident, "You're opening him up more?"
Cristina sighed again, "I need everyone's help. Stem to stern."
Steve and Ryan ran over as Lexie and Cristina switched sides from the operating table, "What--" Lexie stuttered, "what if he can't take it? You could-- You could kill him."
"Or we could help him." Holly added.
"Don't get emotional." Cristina lectured Lexie, "Just get ready to start massaging his heart." She looked at Holly, "Scalpel."
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The monitor continued to beep erratically as Cristina muttered, "Come on, Wilbur. Don't do this." She checked the monitor, "His heart's not filling." She glanced at Lexie, "No, uh, massage it with both hands, like a-- like a heart sandwich."
Lexie nodded, "Okay."
"Good," Cristina continued to work, "good. There. Right there." She scoffed, "Stupid. Look at that. The knife went through his diaphragm right into his spleen." The interns gaped at it, "Okay, um, hand me those clamps." Holly passed her the clamps, "Okay, this thing's coming out." Cristina removed the organ and Ryan held out a small tray for her to place it, "Okay. Suction. Clear it out." Steve suctioned and Cristina sighed, "Hold on, hold on, hold on. Right in here."
Holly looked up at the monitor and shook her head, "Still nothing."
After a small pause, the monitor began to beep regularly and Lexie smiled, "Heart's beating on its own."
The interns laughed together as they saw saw the heart beating, "All right."
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"Babe is indestructible." Cristina informed Dr. Hunt once he returned and she rounded on her pig patients, "She lost a part of her liver and small bowel, but she's been doing fine. We had to cross-clamp Wilbur's aorta and massage his heart. I couldn't locate the source of his bleeding until I found a hole in his diaphragm and realized he had a splenic laceration. He's a-- he's a fighter. He's pulling through. Reggie had some oozing after his colon resection, but we packed it, and he's been stable ever since. Uh, Paddy almost bled out because his carotid was sliced right through, but we put in a graft, and he's been stable ever since. He's good as new."
"That's good." Owen nodded impressively at the group, "That's great work, all of you." He looked at Cristina, "So, uh, put them out and make sure that you write up all your work."
Cristina frowned her eyebrows, "What do you mean, 'put them out'?"
"Terminate 'em." Dr. Hunt corrected, "The pigs-- kill 'em."
Holly scoffed lightly as she heard Dr. Hunt say that-- and she wasn't the only one bothered as Cristina walked away from him and the other interns gaped at him. Holly could not believe she spent practically her whole day saving the life of a pig that would just be killed anyways-- and while she came to realize the pigs would live a suffering life because of the procedures they pulled, she wished the pigs would've had a happy story in the end.
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Holly sighed as she took off her coat and hung it in the coat rack and walked towards the living room.
George, who had been lying on the couch, propped himself up as he heard her footsteps and began, "Okay, I was a repeater and I snore-- you can't cook and you admitted it yourself that you're a sore loser. I just didn't want you to--" George stopped his speech as Holly lied down in the couch next to him and wrapped her arms around him like a koala, "tough day?"
Holly sighed, "I had to bring four pigs back to life and then kill them because they would've had a painful life." She huffed, "I know that's the right decision but I thought the pigs would at least go back to the farm and live." She turned her head to look at the television, "What are you watching?"
"...Charlotte's Web."
Holly groaned as she buried her face in his neck, "George."
"I'll change it." He assured with a chuckle, grabbing the remote, "I'll change it."
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the more i love holly and george together, the sadder i get ✨