Chapter Text
The hospital smelled the same everywhere, bleach, coffee that had been reheated one too many times. Something in between hand sanitizer and human blood.
Grey Sloan Memorial just smelled like a bigger version of every hospital i'd ever worked in. Which suprisingly, just made my stomach turn worse.
I stood in the locker room with my badge still face down in her palm. It freaked me out to even think i'm back to the bottom of the food chain.
ADELINE, KATELYNN — SURGICAL RESIDENT
It looked too clean, too offical. Too much like i'm the newbie that'll freak everyone out and get rumors spread around the hospital before i could find a patient.
Mateo slammed his locker shut beside me. "Katelynn, you're making me wanna kill you."
I looked up. "What?" I never had a clue what he was saying, but odly it put me in a safe mindset.
I clipped the badge onto my scrubs. The plastic hit my chest with a quiet click. Three years into residency and I still wasn't used to seeing "doctor" attached to anything that had my name on it.
"Wait-- Aw, you're nervous." Mateo observed.
"I'm not nervous. Quit self reflecting." I muttered as i slapped his chest.
Mateo smiled victoriously. He's such an idiot.
"I just hate new hospitals, I mean, do you see how big this hospital is?" I admitted.
He leaned against the lockers. "I think you just hate change."
I raised an eyebrow at him, Okay, i think he's officially gone mad.
"You named your coffee machine you dweeb!"
I frowned as i spoke. " Mr. Coffee deserved a name.."
Mateo barked out a laugh. "I miss when you forget you're secretly eighty years old."
I shoved his shoulder. "I'm twenty nine."
Despite myself, I smiled. It faded a second later.
Because this wasn't St. Aiden's. Our hospital was gone. Three years of attendings, nurses, call rooms, and familiar hallways.
Gone.
Shut down because someone in a suit somewhere decided numbers mattered more than people.
"We should go." he said. "I hear being late on your first day is frowned upon."
"Really?"
"No clue, just a hunch"
I slapped him once more before taking lead as we strutted out the locker room. The hallway outside was chaos. Which, honestly helped. A gurney flew past.
"Trauma coming through!"
A nurse nearly collided with me before muttering an apology and disappearing around the corner. Monitors beeped somewhere nearby. Someone shouted for blood. An overhead page crackled.
"Dr. Pierce to ICU. Dr. Pierce to ICU."
Normal. Finally.
Mateo shoved his hands into his coat pockets as we walked.
"First impression?" he whispered.
"I don't do first impressions."
"You literally do."
"I observe."
"Same thing."
"It's not."
"Katelynn."
"Mateo."
He forced down a small giggle.
The main pit opened up in front of us. It was huge.
People moved with purpose. Attendings barked orders. Residents practically jogged through the hallways.
I could feel the rhythm of the hospital immediately. Every place had one.
St. Aiden's had. Grey Sloan had one too.
I just didn't know it yet.
"Dr. Adeline?"
I automatically straightened.
A woman with a tablet approached us. "Orientation starts in ten. Chief Bailey wants all transfer residents in the conference room."
"Thank you."
She smiled politely before disappearing.
Mateo waited exactly three seconds.
"Dr. Adeline."
"Don't."
He smirked. "It sounds weird."
I glanced at him. He shrugged.
"What? I'm sentimental."
The conference room was already half-full.
I immediately noticed the woman standing at the front. Chief Bailey.
Some people just radiated authority.
Jo Wilson sat near the middle, scrolling on her phone. Stephanie Edwards looked awake in a way I was honestly scared of. Leah Murphy sat with her arms folded, yawning.
Everyone looked tired, which was reassuring, because so was I.
Mateo dropped into a chair beside me. "You know what I like?"
I blinked and side eyed him. "What?"
"Nobody here looks happy."
I snorted. "You're awful."
"No, no, think about it. Happy people are suspicious."
Before I could answer, the room quieted. Chief Bailey turned around.
And somehow everyone sat up straighter. Interesting.
"Good morning," she began, nobody answered.
"Good. You're trainable."
A few people smiled.
"We have transfer residents joining us from St. Aiden's."
Several heads turned. I kept mine forward, no point making it awkward.
"This is a fresh start," Bailey continued. "But don't confuse fresh with easy."
"We'll begin assignments—"
My phone buzzed, Mateo's buzzed at the exact same time.
Across the room, several residents reached for theirs.
TRAUMA ALERT
MULTI-VEHICLE COLLISION
ETA: THREE MINUTES
Mateo looked at me. I looked at him.
The room changed, because hospitals did that.
One second you were sitting in orientation, the next, people needed you.
Chief Bailey didn't miss a beat.
"Move."
People rushed past the conference room doors. Someone yelled for trauma rooms.
Another page echoed overhead, "Trauma team to the ambulance bay. Trauma team to the ambulance bay."
The conference room emptied in less than ten seconds. One second everyone had been sitting down pretending orientation mattered, the next, chairs scraped against the floor and people were already moving.
Because nobody cared about orientation when there were actual patients involved. I followed Mateo out into the hallway, nearly getting run over by a nurse pushing an empty gurney.
Chief Bailey's voice cut through the noise before we made it halfway down the hall.
"Wilson!"
Jo practically jumped.
"With me."
"Yep."
"Edwards!"
Stephanie was already moving.
"Dr. Bailey."
"Murphy."
Leah hurried after them.
Then Bailey looked at us.
"Adeline."
I straightened.
"Rivas."
Mateo stopped moving immediately, oh good. I wasn't the only one afraid of her.
"Third years?"
"Yes, ma'am," I answered.
Bailey nodded once. "Good. You've survived long enough to know how not to kill anybody."
Mateo looked deeply offended. "We try very hard not to."
Bailey blinked and then walked away.
Mateo stared after her. "...Do you think she hates me?"
*****
The ambulance bay was chaos, real chaos and not the controlled kind. Paramedics rushed in one after another, stretchers flying through the doors.
Someone was crying, someone else was screaming.
Blood. Too much blood.
But I'd learned a long time ago that panic didn't help patients, it just made doctors worse.
"Thirty four year old male!" a paramedic shouted. "Restrained driver. BP dropping, possible internal bleeding!"
"Trauma two!"
Another stretcher rolled in. "Seventeen-year-old female! Passenger side impact!"
The room exploded into movement, Chief Bailey stood in the middle of it all like she was conducting the army.
"Adeline."
I stepped forward immediately.
"You're with Hunt."
oh.
okay...
Owen Hunt. I knew who he was, everybody knew who he was.
The patient couldn't have been older than seventeen, her face was covered in blood. Blood everywhere.
"What's your name?" Owen asked.
The girl groaned. "Emily."
"Emily, I'm Dr. Hunt. Stay with me."
His voice changed around patients, gentler, steadier. I'd seen that before. Good trauma surgeons always had two voices.
The one they used with staff, and the one they used with terrified people.
"BP ninety over fifty."
I stepped closer. "Her abdomen's rigid."
Owen's eyes snapped toward me. "Say that again."
I carefully pressed again, the girl cried out. Poor thing.
He nodded immediately. "Good catch."
Then louder, "Get me a FAST exam!"
I stepped back automatically as people moved around me. Nobody stopped. Nobody questioned.
"Adeline."
I looked up. Owen pointed at the ultrasound machine.
"You know how to run one?"
No shit. I'm a third year resident not a first year med student.
"Yes."
"Good."
Good, Honestly?
Forty minutes later, I was covered in sweat and someone's blood, Not mine, thankfully.
The seventeen year old was headed to surgery. The driver had survived, three patients had fractures, one had a collapsed lung, and somehow nobody had died.
Which for a pile-up involving six cars, felt like a miracle.
Mateo appeared beside me with two waters.
"Maybe stop appearing like some weird hydration fairy." i muttered as I grabbed a bottle from his hands.
I unscrewed the cap, my hands were shaking, Adrenaline, its always adrenaline.
"Rivas!"
Mateo grimaced.
"Oh, somebody's angry." I whispered as i sipped on my water.
A woman approached us quickly, blonde. Peds badge. Sharp eyes. Beautiful in a slightly terrifying way.
"Dr. Robbins." Mateo stood straighter
He's such a suck up.
Oh, Arizona Robbins, another famous one.
"There was a trauma, where did you go!" she scolded
"I know there was a trauma. I was in the trauma."
"Oh."
Arizona blinked, then sighed.
"Right."
She looked exhausted, actually exhausted. Not dumb idiot resident exhausted. Attending exhausted, the kind that came from responsibility.
"And you are?" She asked glancing at me.
"Katelynn Adeline."
Her expression softened immediately. "Welcome to Grey Sloan."
I smiled politely. "Thank you."
"You're with me today."
Mateo groaned. "Vaginas, really?"
Arizona scrunched her face and waved him off. "Not you, Rivas."
His betrayal was immediate. "What?"
I nearly laughed.
"She's stealing you already?" He huffed and crossed his arms like a child.
Arizona looked offended. "I don't steal residents."
A nurse passing by snorted, Arizona ignored her.
"I borrow them."
He pointed at me. "If she forgets lunch, feed her."
Arizona blinked. I closed my eyes in pure embarassment
"Mateo. I will murder you."
"What? I'm advocating." He said as he threw his hand up in a surrender pose.
Arizona smiled. And suddenly I understood why pediatrics loved her.
"You forget to eat?" she asked.
"No ma'am." I spoke clearly.
Mateo made a noise. A loud noise.
I will kill him in bright daylight, right here, right now.
Arizona looked between us, then grinned. "Oh, this friendship is fun." She giggled out.
I pinched the bridge of my nose. This is so not the first impression I wanted.
She motioned for me to follow. "C'mon, Adeline."
I glanced back once to see Mateo giving me a thumbs up, and just before he disappeared around the corner he shouted. "Remember food!"
Three nurses turned to look at me. I wanted the floor to open up.
Instead, Arizona laughed harder.
Atleast she finds it funny, because if she wasn't here I would kill Mateo.
Arizona walked fast. Not rushed, exactly. Just efficient. Like she'd mastered the art of getting from one side of the hospital to the other without actually wasting any movement.
I had to speed up a little to keep pace.
"So." she said, signing off on something a nurse handed her without slowing down. "St. Aiden's."
"Mhm" I nodded.
"I'm sorry." She said, just that. No pity comments, No fake empathy.
The sympathy in her voice caught me off guard, because she sounded like she really meant it.
"Thanks." I said.
"I know what it's like to have your life rearranged without your permission."
I glanced over at her, she smiled softly, but there was something tired in her eyes. Something old.
Before I could respond, a tiny blur launched itself down the hallway.
"Dr. Robbins!"
Arizona barely had time to react before a little girl wrapped herself around her leg.
The girl's mother looked horrified. "Oh my God, Sophie, honey, we don't tackle doctors-"
"It's okay" Arizona assured her, immediately crouching down. "Hi Sophie!"
The little girl grinned. "I got stickers."
"You did?"
"Mhm. Purple ones."
Arizona gasped dramatically.
"The good stickers?"
Sophie nodded in a way that makes you go awe.
"Well, then.." She stood up slowly, with measured steps. "You better go hide them, I hear Dr. Adeline here likes taking all the good stickers for herself."
Sophie jumped up and opened her mouth in a shocked expression before shaking her head at me and grabbing her mothers hand.
The mother mouthed a thank you before leading Sophie away, Arizona watched them go with a smile before turning back to me.
"Pediatrics." she said. "Never boring."
"I can see that." I laughed.
"Everybody thinks they hate peds until a five year old gives them a drawing and suddenly they're questioning their specialty."
I laughed quietly. "I'm pretty committed to OB."
"Aw, babies."
"Well, pregnancies." I corrected
She chuckled. "That's what Karev used to say". She let out another quick laugh while wiping her hands on her coat.
Before I could even ask, we rounded another corner, and a resident nearly crashed into us.
"Sorry, Dr. Robbins!"
"Slow down before you break something, Perez."
"I will!" A scream came from the hallway before a crash sound echoed through the hall.
Arizona sighed.
***
By noon I had assisted with a fetal consult, met approximately seventeen people whose names I'd already forgotten, and learned two very important things.
One, Grey Sloan had terrible coffee. Horrible.
Second, Nobody here walked, they practically ran across the building for a page like a colonoscopy.
I was standing at the nurse's station trying to decipher somebody's handwriting when someone dropped into the chair beside me. Jo Wilson.
I looked up and she smiled.
"You guys are the transfers, I'm Jo."
"Katelynn." Then I paused. "No, sorry. Adeline."
Jo blinked. "Do you hate Katelynn?"
I shrugged. "People usually call me Adeline."
Jo nodded.
Stephanie appeared beside us carrying charts.
Jo pointed immediately. "Goodluck with her." She scoffed in a joking matter.
"Dr. Adeline?"
I turned.
Richard Webber stood a few feet away. Everyone knew him.
I stood immediately.
He smiled. "Relax."
Easy for him to say. He'd won Harper Averys.
I once cried because a vending machine ate my granola bar.
"Dr. Webber."
"How's your first day going?" He asked, but in his face he looked like he already knew.
I smiled faintly. "That obvious?"
"I've been doing this a long time." He glanced around the bustling floor.
A nurse yelled for labs. Someone paged neuro. A baby cried somewhere down the hall.
Richard smiled, then his pager went off. Naturally.
He patted my shoulder gently.
"Welcome to Grey Sloan, Dr. Adeline."
****
I found Mateo forty-five minutes later, or, I found him sitting on a counter eating crackers while arguing with a nurse.
"It's discrimination."
"Against stupidity."
"I'm pretty sure that's illegal."
The nurse noticed me first.
"Thank God."
Mateo pointed dramatically. "Adeline! Tell Olivia she's wrong."
"I don't even know the argument." I shrugged as i leaned on the table.
Olivia looked exhausted. "He tried to put apple juice in the blanket warmer."
I stared. Mateo stared back.
"...Why?" I blinked at him
"So it'd be cozy."
"I- I dont even-" I pinched my nose and took a deep breathe.
Above us, the speakers crackled. "Dr. Shepherd to OR Two."
Nobody around me reacted, but something about the name made everyone move a little faster.
Mateo popped another cracker into his mouth.
"Who's Shepherd?" I said as i glanced around.
Olivia looked horrified. "You don't know Amelia Shepherd?"
"No?"
Olivia simply shook her head. "You poor thing."
And before either of us could ask, a trauma pager shrieked overhead.
Because apparently Grey Sloan had impeccable timing.
And just like that, everyone moved again.