⇢ CHAPTER 13

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."

✧

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.

✧

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."