Seattle
Saturday, September 22nd
3:42 am
Callie startled awake, squinting against the harsh glare of the overhead light. She twisted around, her satin lingerie sliding against the bedcovers, and stole a glance at the clock on the bedside table. Just after midnight. Had she fallen asleep?
"Arizona?" Silence. Her wife should have arrived home hours ago. Had the flight back from Boise been delayed?
She slipped off of the bed and padded across the carpeted floor to the dresser. She pulled the cordless phone off of its base and checked for messages. Nothing. No messages. No missed calls. No dial tone.
Callie's skin prickled. There should be a dial tone. She looked at the clock again. The red numbers were blinking. Why hadn't she noticed that before? She pushed her way out of the bedroom and into the kitchen where her cell phone sat, plugged in but turned off, on the island. The device had warned her earlier in the day that the battery was dying, but she got caught up in a last minute consult in the ER, and it shut down long before she arrived home.
She pressed and held the power button until the screen came to life with a happy chirp and video montage that belied the tension in the otherwise still room. Finally, a picture of Sofia, the same one she had proudly shown Louise O'Malley, slid into place on her home screen. Followed shortly by the correct time. Shit! She pulled up her contact list, but the voicemail icon popped up before she could dial in Arizona's number.
Four messages from the same, unfamiliar, number.
Callie quickly clicked on the first message. Owen. Asking her to call him back. A simple short, measured sentence. For some reason, it terrified her. If the call was patient related, he would have paged her. She listened to the next two messages, but all she could hear was muted background noise before the call was disconnected. The fourth was very much like the first, a request for a return call. She dialed his number apprehensibly.
He answered after two rings. "Hello?"
"Hunt, it's Callie." She paused and waited for him to acknowledge her, but after a moment of strained silence, she forged on. "You called? Owen?"
"Callie… the plane…",he faltered, expelling a shuddering breath.
"Has it been delayed?" He didn't answer. "My electricity went out at some point and Arizona hasn't called in yet. Are they still in Boise?"
"Torres…"
It was his tone of voice. The same schooled, professional tone that doctors use when they have to push their emotions aside to tell a waiting family member that their loved one didn't make it off the table or out of a trauma room.
"The plane never made it…it never arrived in Boise." He was still speaking, but Callie no longer heard him. The plane never made it. What did that mean? Was it diverted for some reason? Had the thunderstorms rolling in from the Pacific earlier that morning, force the plane to land somewhere else? Somewhere between Sea-Tac and Boise: a small, local airport…one without cell phone signals or landlines?
"Are you there? Callie? Hello?"
"What does that mean?" It was a stupid question to ask. She knew what he was implying, but she needed to hear him say it. Confirm the horror that she was imagining.
"The plane is missing."
Callie crumpled to the floor, her knees suddenly no longer able to support her. No!"What do you mean missing? How can the airport not know where it is?"
"I just got off the phone with an investigator at the NTSB. The pilot wasn't required to file a flight plan with the FAA."
"What about a tracking device?" Callie was grasping at hope. "Don't all planes have a black box equipped with GPS?"
"Yes, but it's not giving out a signal. It could be defective or... or destroyed."
The implication was clear.
Callie froze, heart pounding. "I…what do I do?"
"Just stay there." His voice was calm, belying a confidence she knew he didn't feel. "It's too dark for them to start a search, but the NTSB and FAA are sending coordinators to the hospital in a few hours. We'll know more then."
"Owen…" It came out as a choked, pleading whisper.
"We'll find them."A promise.
She disconnected the call. It was too much to process. Arizona. Mark. Her wife and best friend. Sofia's parents. Missing. Meredith, Derek, Lexie and Cristina. Her friends and colleagues.
All of them missing.
It was three fifty-seven in the middle of the night and they had been missing for hours. How could they not know? How could she not know?
Callie dialed Arizona's cell phone. Straight to voicemail. The phone was off or destr… No, she wouldn't allow herself to think like that. They were fine. They were all fine. They had to be fine.
Her hands shook as she scrolled through her contacts list. She paused over a name, before selecting it. She brought the phone up to her ear and listened as it rang off. Six times, an eternity of waiting, before the call was finally picked up.
"Hello?"
Callie swallowed a sob as her tenuous grasp of emotions faltered at the sound of the once comforting voice. "Daddy?"