S5 EP1&2

NORAH HURRIED UP TO the group of surgeons huddled around a computer at the nurses' station. Everyone was staring restlessly at the screen, waiting for the new rankings of teaching hospitals around the country to be updated while Bailey kept hitting the refresh button.

"Is it up yet?" Norah asked as she leaned over the table to look at the screen.

"No! Wait!" Bailey snapped, "Lawrence, get your hair away from the computer!"

Norah tied up her hair with a sulking face and walked over to the other side of the table. Mark was sitting partially on the table, and he let her slide in in front of him.

"I'm thinking we move up a slot," he predicted, shifting closer to her intentionally. "We pass Hopkins, move up to number one."

"That's fantasising, Dr Sloan," Norah disagreed as she seized his coffee away from his hand, sipping on it while he narrowed his eyes at her.

"You wanna know what else I'm fantasising?" he whispered next to her ear, and she rolled her eyes.

"We're not passing Hopkins," Derek voiced out on the other end of the group, "We're gonna stay in number two."

"Mayo could surge ahead," Hahn interjected, "We could be three."

"Three?" Derek raised a brow, "Pessimist."

"Realist," Hahn corrected him. "The rankings of teaching hospitals change based on any number of things."

Mark shrugged. "Three's top five. I can live with three."

As Izzie tried to hit the refresh button on the keyboard, Bailey smacked her hand away before turning to all the attendings and residents clustered behind her.

"Okay, all of you, back up! Stop hovering. Stop speculating," she snapped at them, and everyone took a big step back. "The rankings will go up when they go up. We have no control over when they are posted."

Norah carefully reached her hand closer to the keyboard, towards the refresh button; the others watched her sneaky movement quietly.

"When it is up, I will say it is up! Until then, back up. Shut up. And leave me alone, so I can-"

"It's up!" Norah announced as she quickly retracted her hand away from the keyboard.

Everyone immediately lowered their heads towards the computer and leaned closer to the screen. Mark was leaning over her shoulder, whispering-dirty-jokes, and she had to nudge him in the chest to get him to shut up.

"Uh, number one: Hopkins. Number two: Mayo..." Bailey began reading, "Three... Cleveland Clinic?"

"What?"

"Four: Mass Gen..."

"Wait, wait-we moved down to five?" Cristina questioned.

Norah frowned at the list of rankings displayed on the screen. "No, we're... We're twelve," she stared in shock. Everyone started mumbling and groaning, shaking their heads in disappointment and disbelief.

"We could hack the ranking," she suggested, and everyone turned their heads to her curiously. "I... well, Tim and I... might've taken one... or two classes of... yeah-bad idea?"

"You are full of surprises," Mark muttered to her.

She smirked back, "It's called having too many interests in too many expertise."

❦ ❦ ❦

THE EVENING WAS SNOWING. Tiny white snowflakes fell from the sky to the dark tarred road; the winter was freezing, without a doubt. The residents were waiting at the ambulance bay, hoping for a trauma case to come while they shivered in the weather; Norah, however, was enjoying the coldness.

"Stop shivering," Bailey snapped, "You're embarrassing me."

"I didn't realise we were gonna be outside," Izzie spoke through chatters. Alex moved to pick up a thick blanket on the gurney behind them and covered it on her; Norah and Meredith narrowed their eyes at them. "I'm okay. You don't have to do that."

"Bundle up," Alex insisted, "You're turning blue."

"Dr Bailey, it is kinda cold out here," Meredith spoke up.

"Someone will come," Bailey stated.

"No one is coming."

"Maybe some old people with broken hips."

"Cheers, but that sounds boring."

"Okay, stop talking," Bailey snapped at the younger residents. "We are Seattle Grace Hospital, and rankings or no rankings, we are going to stand outside. At the ready. On alert. And give the best care available to every single patient that arrives at our door. We may no longer be ranked the best, but I'm still the best. And you're my residents, which means you're the best."

The group of residents glanced at each other, and Norah spoke with a grin, "Aw, that's heart-warming in this weather, Dr Bailey." While the rest of the residents snickered, the brunette received a glare.

Cristina walked out from the ER, all gowned up. She furrowed her brows when she saw everyone standing and waiting outside without an ambulance meeting them. "What are we doing?"

"Freezing our toes off," Norah responded.

"We're waiting for a miracle," Meredith shrugged.

Bailey scowled at the both of them before deadpanning, "Someone will come."

"Dr Bailey, you know that Mercy West is getting all the trauma first," Cristina spoke up.

"Someone will come."

"So we're standing out here in the hopes that someone is severely injured?" Meredith cocked a brow at the Chief Resident, "Wishing and praying that someone is so hurt and so near death-that the ambulance has to bring them here because we're closer than Mercy West."

"Yup."

"Wow. You and god are cool with that?" Izzie asked.

Bailey stared at the blonde resident before sighing. "Damn it, I forgot about god..." she shook her head, "Alright, lets' just go on back inside-"

"Bloody limousine!" Norah exclaimed, pointing to the vehicle that honked loudly, its tires screeching on the icy road. The other residents instantly turned back as the limousine drifted and turned until it finally pulled out in front of the ER doors.

They wasted no time in running towards the vehicle. Meredith and Izzie each got one of the women out of the limousine carefully, calling out for gurneys and wheelchairs. When the backseat opened, all of their eyes widened. The limousine driver was covered in his blood that was still squirting out from god knows where.

"Holy crap," Norah's gasped as she applied pressure on the man's abdomen that was still surging out blood, "Actual bloody limousine-!"

❦ ❦ ❦

MARK STOOD BESIDE Norah while guiding the resident to poke the needle into the patient's face. The patient was groaning in pain while her friend tried to comfort her. "Ow, ow, ow-it hurts!" she hissed, "Are you sure you shouldn't let the plastic surgeon do this?!"

"Dr Lawrence here has great hands," Mark stated, "You'll be thanking her when there's virtually no scar." Norah suppressed a smile as she peered at him over her shoulder.

Bailey walked up to the two women with Cristina following behind her; Norah looked curiously at the excited faces they attempted to hide. "Ladies, um, I've been on the phone with ambulance dispatch," Bailey prefaced, "Three gentlemen in a limousine collided with another vehicle on Broad Street. It's possible it was your husbands'."

Cristina nodded before informing, "They're taking them to Mercy West-"

"-which is across town-"

"-unless you prefer that they be brought here."

The patient raised her brow at them. "We can do that?"

"Oh, you can insist," Bailey nodded, a grin forming on her face.

"Oh, okay, then. We insist."

Norah looked at the pair, amused yet impressed. "That was evil," she whispered, chuckling at the two residents who had walked off with a small skip to their feet.

"That was smart," Mark corrected.

Derek walked past the ER, catching sight of the resident and the attending. The proximity that he was standing behind her caused him to wonder...

"Dr Lawrence?" he called out, and Norah snapped her head to him. "I've got a Neuro consult. You in?"

The way her eyes lit up told a different story.

❦ ❦ ❦

"THE SPINE IS CRUSHED from C6 to T1," Callie informed, "impinging on the cord."

"Lawrence, what do you think?"

"We need to go in and try to relieve the pressure on the spinal cord," Norah answered.

Derek nodded slowly. "But with this kind of injuries..."

"People don't walk again," the patient, Phil, spoke up from behind them. They turned to him, and his wife panicked; her eyes widened in shock as she stepped up to the surgeons.

"You have to be able to do something," Anna pleaded, "Phil's very strong. He has grandkids. Y-You have to do something."

"You could freeze him," an unfamiliar voice spoke from the door, "If you want him to have a shot at walking again."

Norah turned her head towards the source of sound and saw a man in army uniform standing there, looking at them solemnly. The three surgeons frowned at the interruption of the army man; Cristina was standing beside him with an apologetic look on her face.

"Who the hell are you?" Derek questioned as they stepped out of the room, away from Phil and Anna.

"Army Surgeon Badass did something crazy with a pen on a guy's throat," Cristina answered, her tone rather awestricken.

"Well, I would appreciate it if you didn't give my patient and his wife false hope," Derek stated.

"Until you've exhausted all the options, it's not false. It's just hope," Owen argued, "Maybe you should keep current on your research."

"They did make a football player walk at Buffalo Gen using therapeutic hypothermia," Callie spoke up.

As the attendings and the senior resident argued back and forth, Norah and Cristina stood aside, watching them like a tennis rally. "So, he's the pen-trach lad the nurses had been gossiping about?" Norah questioned.

"Mm-hmm," Cristina nodded. "Hot."

Norah turned her head to the other resident. "Hell, Cristina. He's been here for less than an hour, and you look like you wanna make out with him."

Cristina merely rolled her eyes at the fact that the brunette was not wrong. "What about you and McSteamy?" she shot back, "Finally a thing yet?"

Norah was about to open her mouth to speak when their conversation was interrupted.

"Lawrence, let's go," Derek called out. The resident pushed herself off the wall and gave Cristina a wink; the latter shook her head with a sigh.

"Saved by the pissed off neurosurgeon..."

❦ ❦ ❦

NORAH WAS CHARTING BY the counter after the interesting incident-which involved a neurosurgeon and a pissed-off OR nurse-that happened during surgery. Her pen danced between her fingers while she scribbled down word after word in the thick binder.

She had sent her interns home for the night, considering that it was already midnight, and they had looked like mini zombies roaming in the hospital.

"The chief's under the spell of some insane man in camouflage," she heard Derek speak.

"Pen-trach lad?" Norah asked as he handed her some files to pass to the nurse.

"Pen-trach lad?" Mark raised a brow at her as he folded his arms above his chest, "Well, 'pen-trach lad' saved my patient's life. He'll never talk again, but still, life saved." He nudged his head at Derek's hand. "What happened to your hand?"

"Ah," Derek lifted his hand that had gotten bandaged, "Scalpel. Rose. Not intentional."

"Could be intentional," Norah inputted, and he rolled his eyes with a sigh.

"She's a dead mouse on the kitchen floor. At some point, you gotta pick it up and throw it away," Mark stated before gesturing to the injured hand, "Want me to take a look at that?"

"Honestly? I'd rather Norah over you," Derek smiled, and the resident snorted; Mark sent both of them a glare. "But Meredith will take care of it."

Mark furrowed his brows at the other attending. "I'm a renowned plastic surgeon. Grey's a resident."

"She gives me sex," Derek grinned as he walked away from the two, "Especially when I'm wounded."

Norah snickered and handed the last of the charts to the nurse. Mark leaned closer to her, hooking the cuff of her white coat with a finger. He lowered his head to her and spoke in a hushed tone, "You and me, on-call room?"

She turned to him while clicking her pen back into the pocket of her coat; that suggestive smirk stupidly plastered on his face. She looked towards the nurses, who were busy doing their things, before stepping closer to him.

Her hand gripped the bottom of his scrub top, softly tugging him closer while she leaned up to him-but she only allowed her lips to gently brush against his, hearing the soft gulp from him when she whispered next to his ear,

"The supplies closet is closer."

He swore under his breath.

❦ ❦ ❦

THE SHIFT HAD FINALLY ended around three in the morning. Norah felt like her eyes were closing, and her legs were about to give out on her. It was still snowing outside; a layer of white covered the ground, vehicles were moving slowly on the road.

"When are you retaking your intern exam?" Norah asked George as she sat next to him in the empty cafeteria.

"I don't know..." he replied as he tidied up the stack of papers on the table, "Dr Webber seems pissed off by the whole 'number twelve' thing that I didn't even dare to ask him."

She nodded. "Well, do you need help studying?"

"Oh, Lexie is being a great help," he stated, "Her photographic memory really is something-oh, did you know she told Sloan to shut up in his OR today?"

"She did?" she raised a brow at him, "That's impressive. I'll give her that."

George nodded; a question that he had been meaning to ask for a while now raised in his mind. "Is there..." he stammered, "We're friends, right? Good friends?"

"Uh... You're my first friend in this hospital," Norah narrowed her eyes at him curiously, "And you're my favourite from our year."

There was a long silence between them that was right about to turn awkward when he spoke again. "Are you sleeping with Sloan?" he asked suddenly, "I mean-I've seen you two being close, a-and well, I saw the 'Date and Tell' form that you are..."

"Okay-creepy-George, really creepy," she frowned before sighing, "I am actually dating him-yes, you heard that right-and you're the first person I told. Well, other than Tim..."

"Wow, uh..." he looked surprised, suddenly in a loss of words, "You... You two seem good together."

"You think?" she smirked, and George nodded. "Well, you and Lexie..."

"What? Lexie is my best friend," he claimed, "Well, you are my... You're one of my best friends, too..."

Norah snorted, shaking her head. "George, she told Mark to shut up in his OR, and she's helping you study," she pointed out, "Just saying." He frowned, staring at his papers in confusion. As she stuck her hands into her pockets, she felt a warm metal object inside it and took it out.

It was a one-pound coin with the year 1978 engraved on it; not too shiny, not too special.

"Here," she spoke and slid the coin across the table, "That coin helped me aced all my tests since primary school. Count on it as a lucky token-just remember to return in, you know?"

"A-Are you sure?" he asked, picking up the coin and admiring it before quirking a brow at her, "I mean... it's your lucky coin, and I don't want to... I don't know, un-lucky it."

Norah chuckled at the look on his face. "You helped me out when I first came here," she stated, "We ought to keep helping each other out, right?"

"Absolutely-I'll repay you for this!"

"I'll be definitely waiting for it, then."