Yes, I totally stole the homepage title from one of Cristina's rantings at the universe at how insane it is that her life has been in danger so many times, and I will forever be upset that I didn't think of it first.
We pick up exactly where last week left off, all fire and wreckage and blood and people strewn about the forest. The plane broke into pieces as it crashed so when Mere comes to, the only people she knows have made it are Cristina, Mark, the plane's pilot Jerry, and Arizona, who is in some massive shock and realizes that her bone is sticking out through her leg. Jerry is pinned to his seat and can't feel his legs, so the two become disaster buddies in a sense since they aren't going anywhere while the others go off to search for Derek and Lexie. After hearing he was sucked out of the plane as they hit the trees, Mere goes to look for Derek while Cristina and Mark follow a rhythmic clanging sound to find Lexie trapped under the back section of the plane in seriously, utterly horrible shape. Cristina's shoulder is dislocated so she has Mark pop it back into place and then they try to move the wreckage to free Lexie, but they can't budge it. She has Lexie give the rundown of her symptoms which are bad, worse, and devastating, and both women seem to know that this likely isn't going to end well. But Cristina goes to get supplies, and while she's gone Mark and Lexie have a tragically sad scene together where she tells him to tell Meredith how much she loved her, and he tells Lexie that he truly loves her and always has. He tells her that she can't die because they are going to have an amazing life and family together, and she smiles at the thought, and then... she dies. And guys, I am so cynical about this overblown ridiculous storyline and yet I totally shed some tears.
Derek did survive the crash but he somehow got his hand stuck in a piece of plane and to get himself out, has to use a rock to literally smash his hand back through the hole in which it was stuck. Meredith can't find him so she goes back to Mark and Cristina, and completely breaks down when she learns her sister just died. Eventually, Derek shows up and faints upon seeing the girls. When he comes to, they have to create a tourniquet and safety pin his skin back together which is completely gross, but eventually he seems stable enough. Cristina gets mad about Mark just sitting in misery, holding Lexie's hand, but when she goes to yell at him to pull himself together he passes out and she realizes he has a massive chest injury and there is likely blood pooling in his heart. They have to figure out how to use the tube from a bottle of hairspray to get the blood out of his chest before it kills him; they do, but he's still doing fairly awful. By the time everyone gathers at the plane to wait for help he almost gives up but Arizona pleads with him to hold on and come home to Callie and Sofia. But when will they get home? We don't know, and won't know until September because the flare gun was broken in the crash, so when a helicopter flies overhead they are unable to signal where they are and it flies away when it doesn't see anything through the trees.
Somehow, the docs back at the hospital never realize that they are missing because Owen is busy with some big trauma coming in and he tells someone to send all of his calls straight to voicemail. And lord knows there is no other phone line or way of possibly communicating with anyone else at the hospital when a planeful of surgeons fails to show up at its destination. He and Teddy work together all day and he finds out by accident that she's been offered an amazing job basically running all of the Army's surgical operations in the US and Europe. He's pissed that she didn't tell him, and pissed at the idea that he's losing another surgeon, and then even more pissed when she tells him that she isn't going to take it. She explains that while she'd love to leave Seattle and Henry's ghost, Owen was an amazing friend and took all of her shit for months, and now that he's losing the love of his life and things are falling apart she won't leave him there. So later, Owen calls her into his not-office and fires her to force her to take it. She thinks he's kidding but he's totally not, and reads her the riot act for how disruptive and shitty she's been for months. She storms out, but then comes back and the two hug and cry and she orders him to fight for Cristina with everything he's got.
Bailey is still pissed about Ben's shocking job offer, and she sulks and glares like a pro during the few moments we see of them while he tries to convince her that they can make a long-distance marriage work. Somehow, she reaches the same conclusion and tells him that he's no longer to make any decisions like this on his own since he'll be part of a team because yes, she is going to marry him.
Richard has planned a dinner that he does yearly for all of the nearly-former residents and he's excited to take them all out to a fancy restaurant to celebrate. Alex, April and Jackson -- the three lucky enough not to have gone to Boise -- are not in the mood at all and gripe and try to figure out how to get out of it. Callie is in an incredibly great mood because she loves her wife and is surprising her with new lingerie when she gets home, etc. etc. and when she realizes what pills they are being, gives them a big lecture about how this moment of their lives will shape them, and even if things look bad life will work itself out. She's so happy and certain that her life has reached a wonderful place that I fear for Arizona's chances between now and September. Avery finally decides that he's going to go to Tulane though it's kind of killing him to leave April when she's such a mess. She admits she's going to miss him and loved having sex with him but now she's having a total crisis about who she even is anymore. They decide to call a truce for the evening and just enjoy the dinner and hanging out with each other. And here's where it's just stupid. Did no one in Seattle check in with Boise and see how the surgery was going? Or, if they weren't worried about the surgery itself, did no one think to call just to see if it was on schedule before going to the restaurant and being seated? Richard, Alex, April and Jackson wind up sitting at the table with two empty seats and champagne poured, but THEN Richard waits to make a speech until Cristina and Meredith arrive.
And back at the hospital, Owen finally decides to check his voicemails which are all just a series of calls from Boise -- the first message is someone just wondering when the Seattle surgeons will arrive, but the messages get increasingly worried as they report that nobody showed up and no one has any idea what happened. I have no idea why at this point no one from Boise tried calling the general number and asking for someone other than Owen, but I have months to ponder because that is where we wrap up season eight.
I don't know about you, but even though this is the end of the eighth season, it really doesn't feel that long ago that Richard was giving them an introductory tour of the hospital and speechifying that not all of them were going to make it through, that the OR was their arena, and how well they play is up to them. But man, seeing those old clips, everyone looks so much younger than I remember! Especially Richard, who had much more hair. It seems that Meredith is remembering this moment while she stares up at the sky and trees and everyone else around her tries to figure out what just happened. Mark is up and looking around. Lexie coughs blood into the ground. Arizona is also on the ground to the wreckage and she's screaming.
At first, Mere seems to be hearing the sound of chimes in her head but finally the sound of a jet engine combined with terrified screaming starts to permeate her consciousness, and then Cristina appears before her and orders her to get up. Meredith can't seem to fully grasp what has happened but eventually looks down and is surprised to see a giant shard of metal sticking out of her thigh. She grabs a shirt nearby to use as a bandage and pulls it out, while Cristina grabs at her shoulder in pain and tries desperately to find her shoe. It seems to be the only thing that Cristina can fully focus on amidst all of the chaos but when Mere starts asking where Derek and Lexie are Cristina yells at her that they were in a plane crash, and that Derek was sucked out of the side of the plane when they hit the trees and then the back part of the plane broke off. Oh, so they were on Oceanic flight 815, then. Meredith reminds Cristina in a panic that Lexie was in the back of the plane which they now can't see. Mere then feels the back of her head and realizes she's bleeding; she's got a pretty sizable amount of blood matting down much of her hair. She finally realizes that there's a rhythmic banging coming from somewhere, and she, Cristina and Mark all run off to find out what it is. They find the back end of the plane and Lexie's hand sticking out from underneath, banging a seat belt against the fuselage to get their attention.
Back at the front of the plane, Arizona tries to sit up and once she does, rips open her pant leg and starts hyperventilating when she sees a piece of her femur enjoying the mountain air. I'd say that's a fair reaction. The pilot, Jerry, then calls out from the cockpit. They introduce each other and then she orders him not to move so that he doesn't hurt himself further. There's not a whole lot he could do anyway since he's been crushed and pinned to his seat. She reports that everyone is alive but then pauses as she realizes she's not actually entirely sure about that. As he asks if they are all surgeons she begins to laugh, but it's that sad, scary giggle of shock and she knows it as she tells Jerry how funny it is that she is married to an orthopedic surgeon and here she is, starting at her own leg bone. Jerry keeps punching himself in the thigh and finally says to her that he can't feel his legs; he knows it's a very bad sign when that is what finally stops her crazed laughing.
Mark quickly reports that Lexie is awake and responsive. She's completely underneath the tail end of the plane but her upper body is just shielded by a big curved piece while from about the waist down she is pinned completely into the ground. And even though she's awake and talking, her mouth is full of blood and her breathing is short. Meredith is freaking out that they still can't find Derek, so Cristina sends her to look while they handle Lexie. Cristina declares that they have to get her out but Mark just gives her a pointed look; I had realized she was kind of favoring one arm but never put it together that her shoulder was dislocated until she tells Mark that he's going to have to pop it back in. What is it with television and movies' obsession with dislocated shoulders? Every time there is some sort of action, someone's limb pops out like they are a Barbie doll and it's absolutely horrifying to watch when it's jammed back into place. I guess I answered my own question there, actually. Mark takes a hold of her arm and after a moment, she tells him to go ahead. He pulls, and she lets out a primal scream and falls into his arms. Even Lexie jumps when she hears it, or at least the portion of her body not crushed by tons of metal jumps.
Mere has found one of the thick Seattle Grace jackets and puts it on to go looking for her husband. I had many a conversation with people after we saw the -on, fairly sure that a person doesn't usually survive being sucked out of a plane. But I suppose if it was only at tree-height, he didn't have too far to fall. And sure enough, we see him come to half under yet more plane rubble. He can hear Meredith's faint cries but can't manage to make his voice loud enough for her to hear him. He then sees that his hand is jammed up through a crack in the metal and it doesn't look good -- I'm not sure if it's black from grime and whatnot from the crash, or if it's because it's just that injured, but a hand should never look like his does. There's also blood pouring out of the hole where his wrist is pinned. He struggles but can't pull it out and so thinks a moment and then grabs a rock right to him, hauls his arm back and smashes his hand with the rock to try and force it back through the crack. He then lets out a blood-curdling yell from the pain. I would think Mere would have heard that, but no.
As Owen walks down the hall someone who sounds like she is his secretary follows her and tries to give him his phone messages. When he establishes that no calls were about someone dying and none of them were from Cristina, he orders her to send everything to voicemail because he's too busy to talk on the phone. We all know where this is going, right? I mean, what an awful coincidence that his own people are in fact possibly dying and his estranged wife is one of those people, don't you see?? Richard walks up and asks to be put to work; Owen explains that they have a ton of traumas coming in, including a bunch of firefighter recruits who were in a building collapse on their last day of training. Oh man, how could it get worse than that, trainees on their last day involved in something as terrifying as a building collapse? Why, it's almost like everything going on at the hospital is eerily echoing what's going on somewhere in the woods right now. Richard tells Owen he's there until seven, when he's taking the residents to dinner. Owen is kind of surprised to hear it but Richard tells him that it's a tradition of his to celebrate the milestone of the end of their residencies and Owen is welcome to join. Owen sounds like he might have a better time pulling out his fingernails one by one and so he passes, but Richard is still in a great mood because he's sure the residents always love it.
Of course, cut to those residents in the locker room moaning about how much they don't want to go and how jealous they are that Meredith and Cristina are gone (because, you know, they have no idea that they are fighting for their lives, in case you forgot) but April tells them forcefully that they will be at the dinner because she brought clothes for them so that they can change when they get back. April is still in a murderous mood, and when Alex asks Jackson about Tulane and Jackson said he hasn't decided yet with a look at her, she gives him a scowl back that could turn him to stone. Jackson pointedly says that there are still other factors involved in his decision. She tells him he's lucky to leave and asks, when she goes back home, should she make a living milking cows or working at the Dairy Queen? Alex tells her DQ is the obvious choice, and then he leaves. Jackson reminds April that she's still a doctor, but she mutters that he should just go to Tulane and then she shuffles off.
Bailey goes to the ambulance bay where Callie is already waiting, and Ben follows her out; though we left off last week with his confession that he was accepted at UCLA and he sounded all unsure about their future, it seems still wants to marry her as he's trying to convince her that they can be "live apartners." Man, I wish I was making that up. He swears that term is really a thing and there's a wee bit of evidence from Google that this has been used before, but I think he's making it more of a thing than it really is. In my day we called it a long-distance relationship. I suppose giving it a new name might make it sounds more realistically doable than a garden-variety LDR. She's still livid with him and does not sound sure at all that she wants to be an apartner.
She tells Callie about his internship and she congratulates Ben but then sees Bailey's frown and quickly drops her smile. Ben then pleads that there are plenty of commuter marriages, and Callie almost bursts with excitement at the news that they are getting married. She's quickly brought back to earth with another frightful glare from Bailey and warns Ben he should probably leave. Ben goes, calling out as he does that his love can handle this distance. Callie then tells Bailey that a long-distance relationship isn't the end of the world and Bailey thinks she's about to spout a cliché to make her feel better. But instead Callie tells her that distance makes the sex hotter -- she is lusting after her wife, who has only been gone a night, and has planned an evening with new lingerie and flavored body paint for when Arizona gets back. Bailey is relieved to see the ambulance arrive and then goes over and gives a count for the paramedics to then lift him up and out of the vehicle...
...as Mark counts down and he and Cristina try to lift the plane off of Lexie. You see how eerily similar the two situations are? Except the one in Seattle is pretty easy and clean and still involves happy people. Cristina can only use one arm since her recently relocated shoulder is being held up with a makeshift sling. The two of them can't even budge the plane and Lexie can't help it and starts to cry. Cristina looks down so that they can see each other's faces, and asks Lexie to run down everything that's wrong. Both her legs and her pelvis are crushed, and she can't feel her other arm, so she can't be entirely sure it's actually there. Her speech is shaky, and she begins to hyperventilate as she adds that her chest feels like it's going to explode, so she probably has a hemothorax, too. Tears run down Cristina's face; Lexie can barely manage talking and both of them seem fully aware just how grim the situation is. I looked up what a hemothorax is because, as you all know, I am intimately familiar with a pneumothorax but not a hemothorax. What I learned is that you really, really don't want a hemothorax. While a pneumo is air filling the chest cavity and putting pressure on the lungs until they can collapse, a hemo is kind of like that, but with blood instead of air.
Mark walks up behind them and frantically starts telling Cristina what she can get from the plane to help -- fluids, oxygen, etc. and when she just gives him a sad look he yells at her, wondering why she's not doing anything. Lexie manages to rasp that it won't help, but Mark tells her she's going to be fine. Cristina leans down again so that she can look at Lexie and whispers, "I'm gonna be right back." Lexie, who is now shivering and you can see her breath, manages to nod her head and grimace. They both know full well what is going to happen and that this is likely a goodbye, but at this point I was still hoping that they'd pull out some miracle.
In Seattle, they are dealing with patients with very similar injuries but it's all so civilized. Callie has to operate on a guy with an open femur while Bailey deals with a patient who has fluid in their chest. While Teddy works away, Owen tells her that he just got a call from someone they knew in the Army. Teddy plays it casual so Owen tells her that this person was asking if Teddy was going to take the chief job at Med Com. Teddy starts to say that she was going to tell him, but Owen angrily cuts her off and yells that he's losing his head of neuro to Harvard already, not to mention a ton of residents, and he can't believe he's losing his head of cardio too. He works up a pretty good head of steam but she finally gets a word in and tells him that she's not taking the job, but just hadn't had a chance to officially turn it down yet. And then Owen angrily asks her what on earth she means, as if he's pissed that she's NOT taking the job. He's got to make up his mind; he can't have his own blackened and burned little anger cake and eat it too.
Cristina goes back to the other crash site and pokes around the wreckage, trying to salvage things that can be used to make a splint for Arizona's open femur. Arizona tells her that she can splint herself, but that Jerry needs some spine stabilization. Cristina seems to not even have realized that there was a pilot on the plane too. As Cristina searches the plane and finds tape and the flare gun, he reports to them that they should be found in no more than four hours, since there's a transmitter on the plane that should lead the authorities right to them. Cristina grabs a cabinet door that has fallen and then tapes it to Jerry's head and back as best she can to stabilize him, and fills Arizona in on Derek and Lexie. Arizona yelps as she pulls the belt tight on her own splint. Cristina asks him if there's a first aid kit but when he reports where it is, she finds that part of the plane has gone missing. He admits that he can't feel his legs and begs for reassurance that he's not paralyzed but Cristina just comes over, lifts up a pen, and jams it into his thigh. When he has absolutely no reaction to that, she tells him she's sorry and then finishes gathering up water bottles.
Mere wanders back over to them, in a panic that she can't find Derek. Cristina tries to suggest that maybe he went for help and Mere seems to sort of accept this -- it's probably easier to cling to hope, no matter how weak it is, than to just give up. She tells Cristina she has to go keep looking, but Cristina tells her gently that she should come and help Lexie first.
As they wait for Cristina, Mark lays down on his stomach so that he can be as close to Lexie as possible and he keeps assuring her that she's going to be fine. She keeps trying to interrupt him and finally manages to rasp that she's dying. And I must hand it to Chyler Leigh's acting and the Grey's makeup artists because during this scene, right about at this point, you could see in her face that it was totally true, and we were looking at the character who would be the much-hyped death of this episode. Fortunately my cats can't speak or else they might sell me out and admit that I actually lamented, "Oh no, Lexie!" out loud when I realized it. Despite Mark's protestations, she manages to tell him to tell Meredith that she loves her, and that she was a good sister. Mark still insists that she's going to be fine, to the point where he refuses to take her hand when she asks. But he does jump up and desperately try to lift the plane himself one more time.
When he can't budge it, sad music starts up, and he then gets back on the ground as close as he can and wraps Lexie's hand up in his own. She cries as he tells her that he loves her, and this hurts her more than anything because she thinks he's just saying it because she said it first. But he manages to convince her that he truly loves her, always has and always will. He tells her that she has to stay alive because they are going to get married, but as he says that you can see the life start to ebb out of her. He tells her that she's going to be an amazing surgeon, and they will have kids of their own. She manages to whisper that then Sofia will have siblings, and smiles at the idea. Her chest is heaving now with the effort to breathe, and Mark cries as he tells her that they are going to have an amazing life together, and be so happy. Show, why could you not have done this earlier this year?!? You're destroying one of my favorite couples! He pleads with her in a whisper that she can't die because they are meant to be together, and with her last tiny bit of life she manages to repeat, "Meant to be," before succumbing to her injuries. He reaches out and closes her eyes as he sobs and repeats over and over, "I love you." The girls get back and when they see him lying there, his face in the dirt, holding her hand and crying, they realize what has happened.
Mark manages to get himself into a sitting position and has stopped crying; he just looks like a shell of himself as he sits, still holding Lexie's hand. to him, though, Mere is on her knees ugly-crying, her body wracked with sobs as she wails into the forest. Cristina can only sit, shaking her head, and it's at this moment that I realized she's got a ton of blood around her hairline so she's probably sporting some kind of head injury like almost everyone else.
Back at the hospital, Callie has no idea that her wife's femur has made an unwelcome appearance, nor that a co-worker has just shuffled off this mortal coil, nor that looking through a room stocked with copious medical supplies is such a luxury. Alex walks in to rant about Arizona who, it turns out, pulled him off of every single pediatrics case before she got on the doomed flight. He wants to call her, but Callie manages to convince him that he should wait and talk to her once she's back and they both have had a chance to cool off. She then offers him the chance to scrub in with her on her own open femur, and Alex hangs up his phone and takes her up on it. She then brags some more about the crazy sexy evening she has planned for her wife that night.
Owen is working with Teddy and Bailey on a surgery and angrily asks why she's turning down the Med Com job. Bailey figures that if she has to listen to this argument she wants to know what it is actually about, so Owen explains that Med Com is the Army Medical Command, which oversees all medical operations in the US and Europe. Bailey is suitably impressed and Owen goes on to list all of the reasons why it's a perfect fit for Teddy, including that they want to fund her stem cell research. He's completely baffled as to why she is turning it down and Teddy is getting angry, but just maintains that she's not leaving Seattle right now. Finally, he calls her loyalty into question, pointing out that her country is asking her to serve. She pauses a moment and then reminds him that they are currently in the OR where her husband died and that every nook and cranny in the hospital has memories of him. She'd love to leave, but her loyalty is actually with Owen since his life is completely in tatters. She cries as she reminds him that he managed to show her kindness and friendship and put up with all of her horrible behavior when she was grieving, so she is not going to leave him now when he needs the same thing. She then puts her head down and tries to get back to work, while Owen gapes and Bailey just looks so very sad.
When Meredith goes back out to search for Derek, Cristina goes with her. Mere is bordering on panic as she yells his name, and Cristina isn't faring any better. She yells about how crazy it is that she keeps nearly dying, and then rants to the heavens about how when they are found, she's getting as far away from "Seattle Grace Mercy Death" as she can and never coming back. Meredith can barely hold it together; now with Lexie dead she's even more worried about possibly losing Derek and is convinced that since they haven't found him yet, something is wrong. Well, even more wrong than just having been in a plane crash and being seriously injured like everyone else. The two yell at each other to try and keep it together, while both teeter precariously on the edge of losing it completely. When Mere asks if Cristina thinks Derek is dead, Cristina cries as she admits she doesn't know, but reminds Meredith frantically that she already has PTSD so she's not terribly reliable. Meredith desperately cries to Cristina that she is still her Person, even if something something something. I can't tell what she says afterwards from all of the crying and panic, but whatever it is she is interrupted by Derek himself, cradling his bloody, mangled wrist. He's so relieved to see them, he mumbles that he heard her voice and thought he was dreaming... and then he falls face forward and passes out.
Cristina goes back to the main site and is frantically digging through suitcases for more supplies when she yelps excitedly, raising Arizona and Jerry's hopes. They are less excited than she is, though, when they realize what she finally found was her other shoe. The two immobile ones are growing pretty dejected, but Cristina has new footwear-inspired energy as she digs through all of the belongings. She doesn't notice that when Arizona starts coughing, she is discreetly coughing up some blood.
She wheels a rolly suitcase over the forest terrain like she's rushing through the shittiest airport in the world, and comes back to where Meredith is trying to wash out the almost comically large gash in Derek's arm. They've got him propped up against a log by the tail of the plane; he asks about Lexie and Meredith says nothing but starts to shake. He's horrified when he realizes what this means, but Mere pulls herself together as best she can as Derek turns and sees Mark is still sitting there, staring at his feet, holding Lexie's hand. Mere tries to keep everyone focused on the task at hand, which is to try and help Derek. He wants her to loosen the tourniquet so that he doesn't lose his hand, and while she argues that it's there to save his life she does loosen it a bit. Cristina finds a safety pin and Derek asks her to bring that and a t-shirt or something similar over. He then explains that they have to use the safety pin to close up his wound. Thank goodness they happened to find a big one then, and not one of the tiny ones I use to keep my wrap dresses from showing a work-inappropriate amount of cleavage. He instructs Mere on what she has to do and then when Cristina asks what the shirt is for, he explains that he's about to scream a lot and probably pass out. No one is looking forward to this, but Cristina puts the shirt in his mouth and holds it there as Mere apologizes and starts tacking together the thick flaps of skin. He screams and screams, and though Mere pleads for him to just pass out, they have no such luck.
Surgery at the hospital just seems so downright boring now. As they all help out with Callie's surgery, Richard tells them he has to leave so that he can pre-order the duck for dinner, since it takes six hours to cook. Callie realizes with breathy excitement that it's the night of the residency dinner and asks to come, but Richard happily tells her that she had her dinner and now it's their turn. The three of them look like they'd rather be anywhere but there (they have no idea that compared to their comrades they are in Heaven right now) but try to fake excitement when Richard asks if they are looking forward to it. He's either choosing to ignore their tones or he's just so excited about his six-hour duck that he can't hear the sarcasm oozing out from behind their surgical masks. When Richard leaves, Alex cracks that he'll give one of the others $10 to stab him in the face. Callie realizes they aren't excited, and she's not happy about it.
Owen walks up to Teddy as she works on a chart and after watching her a moment, says that now he understands why she was trying so hard to get Cristina to stay. He guesses that if Cristina stayed, Teddy would take this job, and she doesn't answer so it seems to be true. That said, I think Owen is being a little simplistic because I think Teddy would have wanted Cristina there anyway if for no other reason than that she is Owen's wife, so she would have wanted them to patch things up because that's what you do for your friends. But Owen can't really tell up from down at this point, so he can only see that she wanted to be able to go. He tells Teddy he'll be fine but she tells him sadly that he won't, because he's losing the love of his life. Owen finally admits that he already misses Cristina terribly, and she's not even gone yet. Teddy tells him she wishes that she could say that the feeling will go away, but it won't. On that cheery note, she leaves him to his thoughts.
Back on the island, Cristina is thrilled to find some matches and Mere is excited to build a fire big enough, she says, for people to find them. Cristina calls to Mark, wanting him to help them out, but he barely even opens his eyes. Meredith and Derek want her to cut him a break but she thinks everyone needs to help out and points out that Meredith just lost her sister, but she's here safety pinning her husband's arm back together. The tenuous hold she has on her emotions starts to loosen as she walks towards Mark, yelling that the one thing she learned after all of the bombs, and guns to her head, and buses running down friends, is that she wants to live. I mean, seriously, can we take a moment to reflect on just how dangerous it is to work at Seattle Grace? This is why my first reaction to the plane crash was to roll my eyes, because COME ON. Though I guess ER still has a leg up on them since they managed to have not one but TWO helicopter accidents involving a single doctor. Cristina marches over to Mark and shakes him but when she does, his head just lolls forward. She quickly checks his pulse, lays him down, all the while begging him to be okay. She rips open his scrubs and is horrified to see that his entire chest looks like one massive contusion, and then hollers for Mere.
And now we get artsy. Cristina puts her ear to Mark's chest and tells them she thinks it's a cardiac tamponade while at the same moment in Seattle, Teddy realizes a patient of hers has the same thing. Cristina can only be 75% sure that she's right but when Mere worries that isn't sure enough, she snaps that Mere can get her an ultrasound, then. And guess who does have a nice, shiny ultrasound and has Owen run it for her? Sure enough, Nameless Seattle Patient's heart is about to burst and in both locations, they know the blood needs to be drained or their patient's heart will stop. While at the hospital they have a smooth, sterile, fucking giant needle, the wilderness explorers decide to use the tube from a bottle of hairspray. On the plus side, they do have an oxygen mask that they can put on Mark, who is almost completely unconscious. They sanitize the tube with some sort of spray that I assume is a hand sanitizer or alcohol of sorts and while Teddy and Owen do a calm and very neat job of cutting into NSP's heart, Derek tells Mark not to move and they cut into him. Because he's not totally unconscious, he tries to jerk away but they hold him down. Both docs have to be careful not to push the needle too deep, which would puncture the heart, but both are careful and manage to find the blood and start it draining -- the hospital into a nice, sterile bag while the wilderness explorers use a big Ziploc. They all heave giant sighs of relief and Derek kisses Mere; they all seem like they are going to pass out while in Seattle Teddy nonchalantly asks Owen if he wants to go grab lunch.
Callie finds Jackson, Alex and April slumped on benches, trying to fill up on junk food before dinner and lays into them, yelling that this dinner is really important. April stands up and starts to weave a sad tale about how she had a family duck who lived in the house (seriously? I love ducks, but think of the poop!) so she can't eat duck. Callie tells her to order the steak instead, and April is completely stumped by this revolutionary idea. She tries to then talk about their family cow but Callie cuts her off. Callie pleads with them that Richard is so excited, and asks where their sense of occasion is. Alex's is at Hopkins, Jackson's is hanging out with someone who didn't bang his mom and April's fled after she failed the test. Callie has no respect at all for these excuses and reminds them that she was fired as Chief Resident, then fired from Seattle Grace (I seem to recall that it was more her quitting in a huff, but, six of one, half dozen of another when you're trying to teach a lesson, right?) and her husband cheated on her (which was before the quitting/firing but who's counting?) (Besides me...). April takes a moment to be shocked that Callie was married to a man, so Callie uses that moment to add ominously, "Then he DIED." April knew she got pregnant by a man and so clearly isn't totally averse to it, so I don't know that she's allowed quite that level of shock, honestly. Callie's point, though, is that now her life is all puppies and rainbows and that these rough times are just a blip and they should celebrate the moment that is surviving their residency. She had to use the word "survive," didn't she? In case we weren't bludgeoned enough with that, she adds that you need to stop and celebrate these moments because life can change in an instant. For the record, this is the moment that Joe R started getting ultra-worried about Arizona's chances of surviving the woods. After gushing a bit more she concludes that this is their moment, and it only happens once. And, she adds, the duck is freaking amazing. With that, she hits the potato chips out of Alex's hands and leaves.
The day is drawing to a close for the last-day residents who would kill for some food right about now. They pull Mark back to the main crash site and when Arizona asks where Lexie is, no one wants to answer and Mark finally croaks that she's dead. Mere tries to sound upbeat as she announces that they should make a fire, so Cristina hands over their last five matches. Arizona then calls out to Jerry and asks what happened to the four-hour estimate, since everyone knows it's been longer than that. He shushes them as Cristina places a pillow under Mark's head with uncharacteristic gentleness and then screams that there is a helicopter. Those who can immediately jump up and begin yelling and waving their arms, but the trees are obstructing most of their view of the sky. Jerry reminds them about the flare gun so Mere tries to fire it, but it won't work. Derek takes it from her with his good hand and tries to fire it himself, but something is jammed and it refuses to work. In despair, he throws it into the woods as the helicopter sounds like it's flying away.
Evening has fallen in Seattle, too, and Jackson and April are getting dressed for the dinner. Without looking at her, Jackson says that he chose Tulane. April is melancholy, but genuinely congratulates him and tells him this will be good; and he agrees but then turns around and tells her he feels sick leaving her. He can't help adding spitefully that he's glad she's so happy about it. April immediately tells her that of course she's not happy, she's not happy about anything including how she's not a board-certified surgeon, not a virgin and not a good Christian. She softens as she admits she loved having sex with him, but hates that she won't be a virgin for the man she married, and she then also hates that he feels bad about it. She has started crying but tries to pull herself together and heed Callie's words that her problems will still be there tomorrow, and tonight is for celebration. In all honestly, one of her problems might be solved and she might very well have a job after all, who knows. She slaps on a smile and says that she is going to be happy tonight, and is he going to suck it up and be happy with her? His nostrils flare in annoyance but he does buck up and whispers that she looks nice. She returns the compliment, he goes and offers his arm to her, she takes it and they head to the saddest "celebratory" dinner of all time.
Outside, Alex is dressed for dinner and decides to call Arizona after all. He leaves her a message and shockingly, it's not really hostile. He tells her that the only reason Hopkins wants him is because she made him into something, and that he has no idea what she did see in him but now has to go see for himself if he's really something when she's not there holding his hand. Awkwardly, he tells her he guesses he's saying thanks, but then he can't help but cop a little attitude as he tells her if she wants to be mad, be mad. "Bye." Well, it could have been worse. Alex is haunted by so much, I couldn't handle him being haunted by a completely shitty message when he finds out his mentor was near death while he was griping about her.
Night has fallen, and by the way everyone is bundled up it seems it is freezing out in the wild even though they have a small fire going. Jerry admits that since no one has come, it means the transmitter was probably damaged in the crash and Derek realizes that if that is the case, they could be out there for days. Mere just stares ahead and finally says Zola's name. Cristina tries to assure her that Owen must have figured out that they are missing, and he will have sent help. Little does she know that the Boise surgeon only has Owen's number and NO OTHER CONTACT WITH THE ENTIRE OUTSIDE WORLD other than Owen's number, which can be the only reason they didn't try to a little bit harder to get a hold of someone in Seattle to let them know that their plane full of surgeons is missing.
Arizona is sitting with Mark's head in her lap and he is devastated that he didn't tell Lexie earlier that he loved her. Arizona tells him she's sure that Lexie knew, but Mark tells her she didn't and I hate to say it, but sadly I think he's right. He gazes up with blank eyes, and looks genuinely to death himself so Arizona pleads with him to hold on. He wants to go and tells Arizona they will be fine without him, but Lexie is waiting for him. It's too much for Arizona, and she tells him that Sofia, Callie, and she herself are waiting for him, and that they are going to go home together, okay? She doesn't have the energy to yell but her despair is palpable, and finally, Mark weakly agrees. I'm glad, because I genuinely thought this scene was going to be his own journey to the other side. He's definitely not lasting for days if it takes that long.
Owen is sitting in his not-office, looking drained as usual, when Teddy comes in responding to a page. She tries to gently shut down the subject of her leaving and tells him she's happy to stay, and it will be like old times. In response, Owen tells her she's fired. She thinks he's kidding but he tells her that this is effective immediately, and that he knows she has other opportunities. Her smile fades when she realizes he's being serious and she starts shaking with anger, telling him he can't do this to her. Owen coolly tells her that he already emailed the hospital board, and it's a done deal. When she protests, he yells at her that he doesn't want her there anymore, and she should have seen it coming with all of her awful behavior of the past few months. She finally pleads that she thought they were past that, and he tells her that they are, because she's fired. Trembling, she calls him a son of a bitch and storms out. Eerie chimes tingle -- the same chimes that have occasionally rung out over the wilderness crew -- and after a moment Teddy stomps back into the room. They share a long look, and finally she walks to him and he envelops her in a huge hug. They hold each other a long time and she finally orders him to fight for Cristina. He agrees, and tells her to go and be great. As she sobs, he kisses her cheek, and they seem to be kind of holding on to each other for dear life.
Ben is cleaning some things up in an OR when Bailey walks in and immediately starts lecturing him about how he doesn't get to make unilateral life decisions anymore. He can read between the lines, and an amused smile starts to grow on his face which seems to annoy her as she keeps lecturing that he has to do things differently when he's sharing a life with another person. When she asks him if he truly understands that he's no longer a free agent, he grins and asks if this means they are still getting married. She acts offended and claims that she proposed to him; I want to argue that putting on lingerie and a trenchcoat and asking him to ask her again wasn't exactly a proposal, but she wants to be indignant and I'm exhausted by worrying about everyone's lives so fine. She claims that now this is her proposing again and instead of arguing, he grins, teases her a moment, and then sweeps her into his arms. He manages to kiss the glare off of her face and she melts into him. She then asks him for assurance that it's going to be okay, and he tells her it's going to be wonderful. Well, at least until she finds out all of her kids are in mortal danger again, at least.
Finally, Owen decides to check his messages. The first is from Dr. Sheehan in Boise, double-checking what time his surgeons were supposed to arrive. Callie, meanwhile, puts on her new sexy knickers and crawls into bed, posing herself to look seductive and perfect when Arizona comes through the door. I'm sorry, but if you are going to do that, you have an inkling of when the person is getting home. Especially if air travel is involved. ESPECIALLY if surgery is involved. There is no way she'd just assume Arizona was going to walk in the door at an absolutely specific time without double-checking somehow. And another message from Dr. Sheehan starts to play, telling them there is still no word, so she's going to check with the airport and see if the weather held them up.
At a fancy restaurant, a waiter pours champagne for April and the others. (Richard's glass holds water.) He asks if there was any word from Mere or Cristina and Alex tells him that their plane was supposed to land an hour ago. And again, do you not then check to make sure that plane has landed before you start to order? It was conjoined twin surgery -- I mean, all surgeries can unexpectedly take longer than planned, but ESPECIALLY something so delicate and complicated as that. People, you did your own conjoined twin surgery just a few months ago and there were plenty of complications to go around! And then are we seriously supposed to believe that Dr. Sheehan of Boise was just like, "Oh well, those girls have lived together this long, I guess we'll just wait another day because Dr. Hunt isn't answering his phone." NO. This is RIDICULOUS. She or someone on her staff would have tried, oh, the general hospital number and asked to speak to someone else. Richard holds up his glass and the others quickly follow suit, and he tells them that each year he likes to tell the residents a secret that will help them get through all of their future challenges. After a moment, though, he decides that they should wait for Meredith and Cristina before he goes on, and they all put their glasses back down. At the hospital, Owen finally starts to pay attention and look worried when he hears Dr. Sheehan's third message admitting that she's starting to get concerned. I just cannot suspend my disbelief enough to think that they could go all day and into the night with no indication that something was incredibly wrong.
And out in the forest, things are pretty damn wrong. Everyone is bundled up as best they can -- at least they had those big Seattle Grace jackets but they all have on random layers of extra clothing as well to try and keep warm. Arizona is still coughing, while Mark seems only slightly conscious. Meredith and Cristina are huddled together in front of a tiny fire, and Cristina can't focus on anything but how hungry she is. Mere offers to split the single stick of gum she has, but Cristina isn't interested. After a moment, the fire goes all the way out, and Mere starts to doze off. Cristina yells at her to stay awake and then calls out louder to the entire group that they all have to remain conscious. Derek doesn't seem to be complying as his response is to mumble, "Boats." Ah, so the ferry boat obsession is still alive and well, then. Cristina hands Mere a match and reminds her to be careful since this is the last one. Mere strikes it, but immediately the air blows the teeny flame right out again and with that, their hope seems fairly well snuffed out too. Mere pulls out her stick of gum and tears it in half, and Cristina takes her piece without a word. In voiceover, Mere repeats Richard's first words to them as residents: that their years as residents will be the best and worst of their lives. They will be pushed to the breaking point. This is the starting line, and this is their arena. "How well we play, that's up to us." The girls lean in to each other, miserable, and season eight draws to a close.
And so I wish all of you a fabulous summer! Think warm thoughts for our freezing, half-dead surgeons, and we will see what happens to everyone come September. Thanks again to all of you for being the awesomest readers in Awesometown.
Lauren S is a writer and gal-about-town who lives and works in Atlanta, and thinks she has the nicest, smartest, most devastatingly good-looking and all-around fabulous readers on the planet. She wants everyone to know: "The views expressed in my recaps and anything else I might write on TWoP are my own and do not necessarily reflect the views of my employer."