Hey everyone. Thank you all for your reviews on the last chapter. Here is the next. It picks up right were the last left off. I had initially planed for them to be able to save the leg. But for the sake of realism (severed femoral arteries frequently result in amputation) and the fact that it allows for some more exploration of Arizona's feelings (which conveniently allows for more Calzona interaction) I changed my mind about the surgical outcome.

I hope this chapter doesn't disappoint. As always, I don't own Grey's, all mistakes are mine, etc. I think there is one chapter left in Part VI before we start Part VII.

Arizona swallowed, her heart racing as she looked down at her thirteen year old patient. This little girl had her whole life ahead of her and because some psychopath had decided to shoot up a grocery store, it was now unknown what her future held. The racing stopped and her heart plummeted into her stomach when she ran through all the medical options. They had done all they could. And what they could do wasn't enough. There was only one option left. "Cut it off."

"Cut it off," she repeated, "just try to leave as long of a residual limb as possible. It'll um…" She cleared her throat. "It'll make fitting a prosthetic easier."

Callie nodded, her heart broke as she saw how much Arizona was struggling with this decision. "I'll level the bone off at the break. So just a few inches above the knee."

The pediatric surgeon couldn't take her eyes off the open leg, the site of their failed repair. "Good. That's-that's good."

"Arizona are you okay?" The orthopedic surgeon ducked her head to try to meet Arizona's eyes. Catching those blue eyes, she maintained her gaze as the blonde looked back up at her. "If you want to leave, I can take care of this." She knew the other woman was beating herself up internally.

"No." Arizona said firmly. "I can do this. She's my patient and I'm going to stay." She felt an eerie calm come over the OR. The scrub nurses were silent as they respected the two surgeons' obviously difficult conversation and the only noise was the regular beeping of the patient's monitors. The blonde picked up her scalpel as she felt Callie's soft gaze still watching her. Her bottom lip once again found its way between her teeth as she heard the brunette's murmured agreement.

The two women worked silently and slowly, carefully dissecting muscles, nerves, and blood vessels away from the femur. As she sealed the last blood vessel, she saw Callie reach for the curved clamp. Moving her hands away she watched as the brunette slid the metal blade beneath the bone. As she observed the brunette work, Arizona's hearing was muffled like she was under water and she didn't hear the scraping of the metal on the bone but she knew that the orthopedic surgeon had just asked for the bone saw.

Moving down towards the foot of the table, she grabbed ahold of the girl's injured leg. One hand beneath the knee, her other grabbing the ankle, she provided the traction that Callie needed for the next step in the surgery. She was vaguely aware of the orthopedic surgeon saying that she was going to start before she felt the vibrations and heard the angry whirl of metal on bone as Callie began to saw through the femur. Stark had been right. The girl was going to lose her leg.

As Callie worked, the blonde mentally ran through their procedures. Everything that they had done had been for nothing and now here she was, holding the leg of a little girl that was about to become biological waste. She wondered if her amputation had gone like this. Had the surgeons exhausted every option before taking the saw to her leg? No, she reasoned, she hadn't had time for options, she had been dying of septic shock, her leg literally killing her. There had been no time fancy procedures or innovative fixes. She had known for a while, that no matter how much it sucked, her surgeons had made the right call. But it was different for this little girl. She had been hemodynamically stable with no infection and sepsis wasn't even on the radar. She had time for the surgeons to attempt daring repairs and her surgeons had failed her.

Arizona felt the instant the bone gave way, most of the tension dissipating as one of the hamstring muscles and fascia maintained the only connection between the girl's thigh and the rest of her leg. Callie cut through the remaining muscle and the job was done. On autopilot Arizona gathered the limb in sterile drapes and gave it to one of the scrub nurses for disposal. When she looked back, Callie was already closing up the stump, leaving a neat line of sutures to seal the rounded edge.

"Hey Arizona?" Callie's gentle voice snapped her out of her thoughts.

Blue eyes snapped up to brown as the pediatric surgeon raised her head. "Yeah."

"Can you hold the leg up so I can bandage it?"

"Oh. Yeah." She felt numb as she lifted the limb. This was all too familiar and it was not fair that it was happening to someone so young and innocent. She felt like she failed this girl. And furthermore she felt like she had wasted the time of everyone in the OR because Stark had been right. They did have to amputate. But she had made a scene and there had been a full blown argument in the middle of the OR with a patient on the table. Stark would have a field day when he found out about this.

Callie finished and pinned the bandage. She stepped back from the table and pulled off her gloves as she watched Arizona slowly set the leg back down on the table and do the same. "We're all done here." She spoke quietly to the charge nurse. "Can you get her cleaned up and up to ICU? Dr. Robbins and I are going to scrub out and talk to the parents."

When the nurse nodded her head, Callie moved behind the silent blonde and untied her surgical gown before ripping her own off and disposing of them both in the waste bin. She laid a gentle hand on Arizona's arm and gave her a little tug to start her moving.

Aware that Callie was pulling her along, the blonde snapped out of her daze and quietly walked with her to the scrub room. They both automatically reached for bars of soap, not talking as they completed their scrub out procedure. Once she was done, Arizona ran a tired hand over her face before pulling her scrub cap off and shoving it in her pocket

When the water was off and her hands were dry, Callie turned and rested against the sink, crossing her arms over her chest as she looked at the pediatric surgeon. "Will you tell me what you're thinking Arizona?" She reached out and tucked a blonde lock behind the other woman's ear, smiling gently when Arizona leaned into her hand.

The blonde squeezed her eyes shut to keep the tears at bay, bringing her own hand up to keep Callie's on her cheek. "That Stark was right. I underestimated how much that was going to affect me."

"No. No." Callie shook her head, pulling her hand back and placing her palms on the blonde's shoulders. "Stark was not right at all Arizona. He wasn't even going to try. You fought so hard for her. Remember how you said it was a pediatric surgeon's job to advocate for their patients because they can't do it for themselves? That's what you did today. She would have wanted you to try, and we did our best. Sometimes it's just not enough and as surgeons we know that." She raised her hand and dried the tears that had spilled onto pale cheeks. "And as for the other things Stark said, he couldn't have been more wrong. You are a fantastic surgeon Arizona and no matter how much it affected you, you were able to make the right call in that OR today. You have no idea how proud I am of you."

A timid smile found its place on the blonde's lips as she nodded her head lightly. She leaned forward, placing her head on the taller woman's shoulder, wrapping her arms around her as she held her tight. "Thank you Callie." She took a comfort in the brunette's warm embrace. They fit together and it was perfect.

Callie loved how Arizona's head fit perfectly against her neck, blonde hair tickling her chin. She pulled back slightly and pressed a kiss to the top of Arizona's head, lingering slightly longer than a friend would as she inhaled the smell of the blonde's strawberry shampoo. That was something that hadn't changed in all the years she had known her. "You are so welcome Arizona." She squeezed her tight before releasing her and looking into her bright blue eyes. "Do you want me to go talk to the parents alone? You don't have to come."

"No. I'll come with you." She slipped her hand into Callie's and gave it a tight squeeze before letting go. "I can do this."

The brunette smiled, "I know you can."

Arizona stood outside the chief's office, shifting her weight as she nervously twisted her fingers, trying to convince herself to knock on the wooden door. She and Callie had just finished talking to the parents of their thirteen year old patient, Abbie Greer, and it had been an emotional experience.

"Family of Abbie Greer?" Callie stepped into the waiting room with Arizona at her side. The room was packed with the family members of the supermarket shooting victims.

"Right there." Arizona whispered as a couple stood up from the chairs in the corner of the room. The man rested his hand on the back of a petite woman who had her arm in a sling and blood on her clothes. "Abbie was shopping with her mother."

They walked over to the couple and gestured for the man and woman to follow them to a more private area of the waiting room. "Mr. and Mrs. Greer? I'm Dr. Torres, this is Dr. Robbins. We just finished operating on your daughter."

"Abbie, how is she?" The father asked desperately, his voice laced with concern as his wife leaned against him, her face the picture of a worried parent.

"She is in the ICU. Our plastic surgeon repaired her facial trauma and we did the repair on her abdomen. Unfortunately we had to…she…" Arizona stopped and swallowed, unable to continue as the parents eyes bore into her, pleading for details on their daughter.

Callie seamlessly picked up where the blonde left off, subtly moving her hand to the small of Arizona's back. "The damage to the main artery in her left leg was too severe. We attempted several venous grafts, harvesting a superficial vein from both her right and left legs. But there was not enough replacement vessel to bridge the gap in her thigh. We had to…"

"No." The mother's voice came out as a pained whisper.

"…amputate her left leg…"

"Please no." The petite woman continued to plead as she squeezed her eyes shut, her husband leaning down to place a kiss on her head as tears welled up in his eyes.

"…just above the knee." Callie chanced a glance at the blonde beside her while the parents weren't looking at them. Arizona was looking straight ahead, watching the parents try to understand their daughter's loss. She could see the compassion and anguish in the peds surgeon's eyes and increased the pressure of her hand on the small of her back, just reminding the blonde of her presence.

Arizona found herself wondering about her own parents. Had Barbara and Daniel reacted this way when they were told about their daughter's lost limb? Had the surgeon that came to them in the waiting room been callous or were they compassionate like Callie? She didn't know. And in this instance, she didn't care. She redirected all her attention to the parents of her patient and cleared her throat as she leaned into Callie's hand. "Mr. and Mrs. Greer, I want to express my most sincere condolences for what all of you have experienced today. Depending on how her recovery goes, Abbie will need to spend about two weeks in the hospital. When she wakes up, we will move her out of the ICU and to the pediatric floor where I will be overseeing her care." She bit her lip and paused as the parents looked up at her, their eyes full of tears. "I know-I know this seems impossible right now. But she is a survivor and she will get through this. When the surgical site is more healed we will get her started with physical therapy and walking with a prosthetic limb. We also have counselors available for her or either of you if you so need. She'll need your support as she comes to terms with what she has lost. But she can get through this." Arizona held their gaze, speaking clearly with a calming tone that came from years of working with worried parents. "If you head over to the nurses' desk, they can take you up to her room. You'll want to be there when she wakes up. It is better if the news comes from you than from a doctor she is not familiar with. If there is anything you need, please do not hesitate to page me. Any of the nurses can get ahold of me and I or one of my staff will be there as soon as possible." She paused again when she saw the father nod his understanding. "Once again, I am so sorry for what has happened."

The father continued to nod his head as he extended a shaky hand towards the pediatric surgeon. "Thank you Dr. Robbins." He shook her hand before extending it to Callie, "Dr. Torres." He shook her hand too before slipping his hand into his wife's uninjured one. "We're going to go see our daughter now." They walked away from the pair of surgeons, heading towards the nurses' station.

Once they were out of ear shot, Arizona let out a heavy sigh, turning to face the orthopedic surgeon.

Callie smiled down at her, rubbing her arm gently. "You did a good job Arizona. I know it wasn't easy."

"I was thinking about my parents." Arizona admitted. "How they must have felt when they got this news. But then I pushed that thought away and focused on my patient and…it wasn't any harder than taking to the parents of any other patient." She was surprised as she came to this realization. "I know some part of me is going to feel guilty about this little girl. But this isn't about me. It's about her. And I can help her."

Callie's smile widened. The blonde's selflessness made her heart skip a beat. Just another little thing that made her fall more in love with the woman before her. "You are amazing."

Arizona's cheeks reddened in a blush. That was a sentiment that she had echoed to the brunette time and time again while they were dating. Hearing her words come from Callie's lips, she couldn't help but smile sweetly up at her.

They stood in silence for several more seconds until Callie's pager started to beep. The brunette broke eye contact and groaned, looking down at the device. "Dr. Whit needs me in OR 3."

The blonde nodded. "I have to go meet with the Chief. So I'll see…"

"I'll see you later." Callie grinned as the peds surgeon's blush spread again. She turned on her heel, walking off, giving her ass a little shake just for the blonde's benefit. Her grin remained plastered on her face as she heard Arizona's muffled giggle behind her.

Talking with Callie, Arizona had felt some of her confidence return. But now, as she stood in front of the Chief's office, her issues with authority played a little on her nerves. Taking a deep breath, she raised her fist and pounded on the door. She only had to wait a second before Dr. Webber called for her to enter. Sealing herself, she pushed the door open and strode into his office, head held high.

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