Chapter 16

SEATTLE GRACE

THE NEXT DAY

"Dr. Austin, I got your -" Christina abruptly looked at the other man in the conference room. "What the hell does he want?"

Neither Dr. Austin nor the familiar looking stranger even blinked at Christina's hostility.

"Yang, I realize you went to medical school, not charm school, but I hoped that you at least had the bare minimum of social grace," Dr. Austin said resignedly.

"This is me being polite," Yang said hostilely. "First, you're spying on my routine surgery at the end ass of the morning, then you're roaming the halls looking at me funny. In what world am I supposed to be polite to stalkers?"

Austin heaved a sigh. "My apologies, Mr. Moriarty," she said tiredly.

Moriarty – whoever he was – waved it off. "Believe me, I've been treated far worse by people in my life," he said with a shrug.

"Dr. Yang, this is Dean Moriarty. Mr. Moriarty has come to this hospital – where there are far better and infinitely more polite surgeons – apparently with the sole purpose of interviewing you," Austin said with exaggerated politeness. "Apparently, because he only knows you based on your surgical record, he believes that you are a good candidate for the organization he works for that seems to be at the cutting edge of medicine. He wanted to talk to me before I called you in because he wanted to have a conversation with a qualified surgeon as to what kind of doctor you might be. I've spent the last twenty minutes talking about all of your good qualities, which I have to tell you required at least fifteen minutes of filling time, and which you probably helped torpedo in" she looked at her watch, "maybe twenty-six seconds. You have to be an excellent surgeon for most people to work past that kind of behavior. " Austin narrowed her eyebrows. "Trust me when I tell you that you're not nearly as good as you think you are."

Christina really wondered if there was a crack in the floor that she could crawl into right now. Kathryn Austin already didn't have the best opinion of her and now it looked like she dropped even further beneath that already low bar. "I'm truly sorry for what I said," she began.

"Don't apologize to me. "You continue to live down to my opinion of you," Austin said. "I suggest you listen to what Mr. Moriarty came here to talk to you about it. I also strongly advise that you find whatever civil tongue you have in your head and hope that you can persuade him to forgive you for the absolutely horrendous impression you've just made on him. Who knows? You might actually learn something from what he has to say."

Dr. Austin walked past Yang towards the door. "And by the way, take as much time as you need. I was considering asking you to scrub in on my next surgery but I think you need some time to reflect." She walked out before Christina could come up with an answer.

"You make friends easily, don't you?"

Yang turned around to see Moriarty actually smiling.

"Mr. Moriarty –"

"Dean," he said. "And while I understand why Dr. Austin reacted the way she did, it's not like you didn't have a point. I've been accused of many things in my life. Subtle has never been one of them."

Now that Dr. Austin was gone, Christina was uncertain how to proceed. Moriarty did not seem to be holding a grudge. Still, if only because she wasn't entirely certain he wouldn't report this back to either his boss or Austin, she decided to do the harder thing.

"It doesn't justify my rudeness," she said.

"After I had a conversation with some people about what I do for a living, I've actually been beaten up by a couple of them." Moriarty had to be kidding about that to make her feel all right about her attitude. "I'm used to people not trusting me or even liking me. It's one of the things that comes with being in charge."

"In charge of what?"

Moriarty smiled again. "Have a seat, Dr. Yang and I'll tell you of what."

Christina sat down. Moriarty handed her a manilla file. Clipped to it was a business card with Moriarty's name.

"I'm a representative of Mittelos Bioscience."

"I've never heard of you."

"That's by design." Moriarty said. "The work we do at our facility is beyond the cutting edge of science. So much so, that even such terms as 'revolutionary' and 'transformative' may seem insignificant to describe it."

Christina couldn't help but be intrigued by this despite herself. "So all of this is about trade secrets?"

"I don't think that's even close to accurate," Moriarty began. "The ways that Mittelos is…"

He trailed off suddenly. "The way you spoke to me, it's rare that I encounter someone who is so purely and utterly honest about their feelings. You have no idea how much faux civility I have to go through every time I go out on these headhunting expeditions. People saying how much they'd like to work with us, how they've heard about our company when they clearly they're mistaking us with someone else. The ones who say that they'll get back to me and never even give me an email rejection."

"People are jerks," Christina found herself saying.

"Not most of them. But a lot of people in your profession…" He trailed off again.

"And my treating you like this doesn't make me a jerk?"

"Maybe. But at least you're honest about it. I prefer honest bad behavior to fake manners." Moriarty said. "And that kind of honesty deserves mutual respect."

This was not how Christina had expected this meeting to go. "Is your sales pitch complete bullshit?"

"The one Mittelos wants me to make is," Moriarty told him. "It doesn't mean you won't want to work with us if you don't hear the real one." He hesitated. "How much science did you end up studying beyond medical science when you were in college?"

Christina thought for a moment. "You have to do a fair amount of requirements when you're in college. Chemistry, astronomy, and some physics. Which of these is the most pertinent?"

"Probably the last one," Moriarty seemed to be struggling for the right words. "I have a decent education but I certainly didn't go to med school, so I may be the wrong person to give a coherent explanation, but from what they tell me – and what I've seen – what Mittelos is primarily working on has to do with as much physics and physical science far more than someone with surgical training would be qualified to deal with."

Christina would have been inclined to agree normally, but the part of her that didn't like backing away from any challenge didn't let her do so automatically. "Layman's terms what are we talking about?"

"This may be the part where you dismiss me as slightly worse than a snake oil salesman," Moriarty said with a small smile. "But based on what I've seen, the people at Mittelos main goals appear to be to find a way to manipulate energy in ways that don't seem possible."

"Are we talking what, some kind of permanent renewable energy? Something to replace fossil fuels?" Christina asked.

"That is one of the things there working on, but according to a couple of the people I've talked too, that's just what they're trying to do to keep the lights on, pun intended," Moriarty said. "A lot of it is purely in the theoretical stage and honestly it's more Michael Crichton than Robin Cook."

"They both did work in medicine before they went into fiction," Christina reminded them. "And Crichton did write Andromeda Strain before Jurassic Park."

Moriarty's eyebrow went up. "Good to meet a fellow reader. And to be fair, we are talking the science part of his fiction there. Though admittedly, the less realistic kind."

"Are we talking space exploration or time travel?" Christina wasn't sure how much she was joking.

"I haven't seen any rocket ships or satellites," Moriarty answered seriously. "Though for all know that may be a little further down the pike."

"You really are more of a grunt than in the field, aren't you?" Christina was actually sympathetic.

"None of them would deign to grace a mere surgical resident with their presence," Moriarty agreed. "Though try not to be insulted; they've sent me to meet top notch physics professors and Nobel-Prize winning chemists. The fact that I'm not meeting with you probably says less about how highly they rank you and how much faith in me to get the job done."

"That must suck," Christina said shaking her head. "Top notch scientific research being done; you're trying to convince a woman who isn't even a full-fledged surgeon yet to work for them."

"Janitors get more respect than people like me," Moriarty said sadly. "Boy, I'm doing a crappy job selling you on this."

"Hey, worst case scenario, this is good practice for me," Christina said. "I was going to have to hear pitches like this when I completed my residency and I doubt they'd be anywhere near as honest as you would about the flaws in their programs."

"Honesty trumps civility every time," Moriarty agreed.

"Do they at least pay you a lot to make trips like this?"

"It's a healthy stipend," Moriarty said. "When you have the kind of funding Mittelos does, at the very least they spring for high class hotels for you to stay at."

"I hope you at least max out your expense report on this trip," Christina said.

"Always do." Moriarty told them. "All my badmouthing aside, it isn't like the work isn't worth the time. The whole reason I'm pitching to you as much as anything is because among all their other work, Mittelos is trying to find new ways revolutionizing medicine. Hell, that's one of the few places where I actually have seen some results of the work that they do."

"What kind of work?"

"Most of is related to the rapid healing of injuries. At Mittelos, they've perfected techniques where wounds that usually take weeks or months to heal can completely disappear in a matter of days, often with no sign of scarring or residual pain."

That was intriguing. "How extensive is their research?"

"Extremely thorough," Moriarty's eyes were lighting up. "Broken bones, bullet wounds, all heal in a matter of days. And according to them, that is the tip of the iceberg. Paraplegics, infertility," he lowered his voice, "there are even rumors that they may be this close to finding a cure for cancer."

"Oh that's got to be bullshit," Christina said.

"I don't fully trust that one myself," Moriarty admitted. "The rest of it… they may not let grunts like me do the real research, but they can't hide patient records from the people who work there. And hell, when a man you see comes in on a wheelchair and leaves walking a few days later, you know they must be on to something."

Moriarty had been right this was a hell of a pitch. "What's the catch?" she demanded. "No company basically gets this close to curing the common cold and doesn't brag about it."

"You've hit on the nose, Dr. Yang," Moriarty said. "This company operates in conditions so secretive I honestly think the Manhattan Project may have given more freedom to its employees. " He opened the folder he was carrying with him. "I suppose you're familiar with these kinds of documents?"

Yang opened it. She pawed through it for a few moments before her eyes began to glaze over. "I don't think I've ever seen a confidentiality agreement this dense before."

"Technically, I was supposed to make sure you signed before I started my pitch," Moriarty said. "But half the people I come to walk out of the room before they're halfway done. I can't exactly say I blame them; most of the people I talk to at Mittelos are the legal team."

"Well, if they're doing what they say you are, they've got a right to protect their secrets," Christina said almost kindly.

"The only organizations who have teams this extensive are Big Tobacco, Big Pharma, and any major political group. And that's not a group that anyone in medicine wants to sign up with," Moriarty said. "I know. I should stop selling."

"I appreciate honesty too," Christina agreed. "How much of this is about trade secrets and how much is about not pissing off the lawyers?"

"Probably both and maybe something from column C," Ben pointed out. "I'm not supposed to tell you this part at all, but I've never been allowed to the place where they perform all these remarkable feats of science. I'm not even sure I know where it is."

Christina found herself more intrigued by this than the company she was signing up for. "So corporate doesn't go anywhere near the labs?" she asked.

"I admit that might be a pitch for someone like you," Moriarty said. "I don't know what kind of oversight Mittelos does as far as the scientific end, but I think this may be a case of the left hand not caring what the right hand is doing as long as they get results."

Christina couldn't deny there was a certain appeal to this but even she knew there was a hell of a risk to this kind of freedom - she knew very well that's how a lot of scientists in Germany and Japan had been given 'the freedom' to do their work. "Aside from the obvious downside of this what other strings are involved?"

Moriarty actually looked around twice before he reached into his satchel again. "I'm not even supposed to show you this part until you've finished with the confidentiality agreement," he said. "But what the hell? They decide to fire me, there have to be more emotionally satisfying jobs than this one."

He took out a single sheet of paper, this one with much smaller print. "I think the part that might be the biggest obstacle is Section D."

It took Christina two seconds to find the section, and about five more for her to put her jaw back in her head.

I agree to spend no less than one year in this location without first being informed where it is, telling anyone where I am going and not making any contact with anybody, family or friends included, from the moment I enter the facilities.

"Forgive my French, but what the fuck?" Christina said.

"Even after going through all the headaches, only five percent of the people I end up coming see agree after this," Moriarty paused. "I am told I am one of the most successful recruiters in the history of Mittelos. That doesn't make me feel as good as you might think."

"What the hell are they do and where are they doing this shit?" Christina said. "Seriously are they even on this planet?"

"You don't know how many times I've heard some variation on that," Moriarty said. "The most imaginative guess I've heard so far is one of the circles of Hell. And I can't even tell them whether they're warm or cold."

"That's the best case scenario." Yang looked at her. "Do you even know who you're really working for?"

"You mean what organization might be providing Mittelos with funding?" Moriarty asked. "I've engaged in some wild speculation myself. I mean, if an organization like this had been around when I was growing up the obvious explanation would be something connected to the Cold War. The kind of stuff they're doing could have been the work that either side would have been party to. If it had been established within the last five years, I might think it has a link to Homeland Security or CIA."

Yang honestly didn't think either possibility was that outlandish given what she'd been told. "Mr. Moriarty…"

"I could very well get fired for telling this much, I think you can call me Dean," Moriarty said almost cheerfully.

"All right, Dean," Christina said doubtfully. "You've made this kind of pitch, and even given the utter insanity of everything you've told me, I won't lie that there aren't some extreme aspects to it."

"You're not worried about selling your soul?" Moriarty said with a smile.

"I don't believe in the soul. My freedom, that's a completely different story, and it's pretty clear that I do that much when I sign up." Yang said. "Everyone who goes to med school dreams of changing the world it some way. At some point, most of us tend to give up on that concept. I don't know what it says about me that I still think I can."

"It says you're ambitious and that you have the commitment to see it through," Moriarty said. "Hard to argue that those are bad qualities."

"I work with some people who would say otherwise," Christina admitted. "And while I don't deny their accuracy, I've been trying to pretend otherwise until my residency ends and I can go somewhere else and do just that. I have a feeling that may be the reason you were sent here."

Moriarty looked at her. "And now that opportunity is here, what are you thinking?"

"Maybe you're a worse salesman than you think," Christina said. "See I've always wanted to be one of those revolutionary doctors – the Schweitzer's,' the Barnards,' the Ellis Greys' – and I think I can be. An opportunity like this no doubt would give me that chance to do so without all the pesky oversight that I've been chafing against. However, looking at the level of paperwork involved –"

"You're considering that you might have to become a Mengele to get there," Moriarty finished.

"That's perhaps too extreme," Christina said, "but I won't deny the name didn't cross my mind."

Moriarty was silent. "I've already broken quite a few rules already. What's one more?" He reached across the table and picked up the folder. "I'm only in town until tomorrow. Why don't you take the day to think about what I've told you? If you think you're up to the challenge, give me a call and we can go through the paperwork then. If you don't, just call me and say you decided to take a pass. I'll tell the home office you balked at the paperwork. They hear that so frequently they'll never question it."

He handed her a business card.

"Should I just pretend this conversation never happened if anyone asks?" Christina asked, expecting a positive answer.

"I'd appreciate it if you left my name and the company's out of it," Moriarty said. "Just tell them that I came to see if I can steal you away from your residency. It's true enough."

9:00 PM

Christina had tried to go about the rest of the day as if nothing had happened. Dr. Austin had, surprisingly, never bothered to follow up on what Moriarty had wanted but had followed through by scratching her from whatever surgery she'd planned.

She knew that she should talk to somebody about this – Meredith definitely, but Bailey or even Weber, considering how this might affect the hospital – but for some reason, every time she tried to approach one of her friends or colleagues, she found herself walking in the other direction as soon as she came near them. She knew very well a decision like this couldn't be made on her own, and that she needed someone to make a Socratic argument as to the pros and cons.

The problem was all too obvious. She wasn't sure whether she wanted to be talked into taking the job or out of it. And considering how badly she had burned her bridges with so many people in this hospital the last couple of years, Christina couldn't say with any degree of certainty which side any of them would come down on if she forced the question.

Finally after four hours of being unable to concentrate on her job or decide who to ask for advice, she found herself going into the locker room, changing, and heading to Joe's. She wasn't certain whether it had been to drown her sorrows or to find courage at the bottom of the glass. Very quickly, it became a moot point because after her first beer the surgeon in her realized that making the most important decision of her life while being impaired was a lousy career move no matter how you looked at it.

So instead, she had found a table and ordered hot wings and Pepsi. She'd finished eating an hour earlier and found herself unable to do anything else other than keep putting coins in the jukebox.

Joe walked over to her. "Normally, I'd be fine with you spending the whole night here and not buying anything," he began. "It's just…"

He gestured around the bar, which was understandably pretty much packed.

"I don't think I'm going to be putting more in the register," Christina genuinely liked Joe and considering how business the hospital gave him, the last thing she wanted to do was to hurt his business. "You've seen my tab; you know I'm good to get home by myself."

Joe nodded. "Any reason you're here and not with your friends at Seattle Grace?"

"For one reason, I'm not sure how many of them are even my friends anymore," Christina said. "Wow, I can't even blame that on being drunk."

"People confess their sins to the bartender as much as they do their doctor," Joe said with a smile. "Figured you'd know that by now."

Christina smiled back and looked around. "Pretty good night, considering it doesn't look like anyone on staff is here," she said. "And since my pager hasn't gone off we can't even blame that on a mass cas."

"It's not entirely quiet," Joe said. "Couple of nurses, few med students." He gestured to the bar. "If I hadn't seen his face on the news more than once, I'd have forgotten he works with you."

Even though Christina knew without looking who Joe had to mean, she wasn't sure she could process it. Jack would occasionally show up at Joe's from time to time, but rarely for long and never for more than a round or two. Given what Kate had told her about him last night, it was hard to blame him.

"How long has he been here?" she asked.

"Half an hour, give or take," Joe said. "Pretty much running the same tab you are, nothing stronger than ginger ale since he got here. Which means either he's no fun at parties or he's getting over being bitten by the bottle."

"A little of both," she muttered under her breath.

If Joe heard this, he used the discretion most bartenders did.

Then Christina made a decision. She needed someone's advice, someone she respected but who could remain impartial. And sometimes if you don't want to talk to your friends, sometimes you have to talk to someone who hates you – or at least didn't like you very much.

"You mind if I go to the bar?" she asked Joe.

GLGLGL

"I think there's a line in Casablanca about this," Christina said.

"I didn't know this was your bar," Jack said, looking straight ahead.

"In the sense that I frequent it more than you do," Christina paused. "Meredith told me some of your history."

"Mine or my father's?" Jack asked.

"Just yours," Christina hesitated again. "She did add that you probably got into this line of work for the same reason she did."

Jack seemed to relax a little. "At least Meredith loved her mother. I didn't realize how much my father loved me until he was dead."

"You might if I sit down?"

"Still a free country."

Christina did. "If I offered to buy you something stronger than club soda, can I trust you not to take this an invitation to go on a bender?"

Jack actually gave a small smile. "Despite what you may have heard, I was never as bad off as Richard. Though I don't want to think how close I came."

"Then we'll stick with just one drink. How heavy do you want to go?"

"Keep it traditional. Gin and tonic."

Christina asked for two. "Seriously, why are you here?"

"Because of you." Jack said. "Meredith told me you'd been kind of distracted during your shift and then cut out early. She says by your standards, that's the equivalent of getting ready to either slash your wrists or decide to go on a three-day bender. And since she's pretty sure that if you'd done the former, you'd have turned up at the hospital by now, she sent me here to check on you."

She admired how deadpan Jack had been in his delivery. "So why'd you come here?"

"I'm the only person in this hospital who would wait until I got completely wasted to drive you home and not ask a question one way or the other." Jack said. "I have to say, given all the panic you've caused Meredith, the last half-hour has been a disappointment. I really wanted to know whether you were a funny drunk or a mean drunk."

"Please tell me you at least told Meredith I was fine," Christina asked.

"Meredith's a good doctor and a good person. Why she seems to invest so much energy in caring about someone who gives so little in return I'll never know," Jack said in the same casual tone.

Before it could truly sting, he added: "Not that I don't admire her for showing her feelings. It's something that people like you and me don't really seem to do unless we're forced to."

Christina was considering whether this was a compliment or an insult when the drinks arrived. Jack, to his credit, sipped it rather than drained it.

"Actually, I don't think I've ever truly thanked you," Jack said as he put the glass down.

"For what?" Christina asked.

"For months after I came back to civilization, the only questions anyone ever wanted to know was what happened after the crash. Not just reporters or Hollywood, but almost everyone else in this hospital. Even when I took the job here, for months I had the feeling that everyone who looked at me was silently trying to find a way to ask the questions I didn't want to answer." He paused. "You are the only person in this entire hospital – maybe in the world – who's looked at me with the same dead-eyed detachment you approach everybody else with. And while I admit that is hardly the best quality for a healer, for someone like me I found it refreshing."

Again Christina wasn't sure whether this was an insult or a compliment.

"If you want, you could ply me with drinks and maybe if I get loaded enough, I might tell you all my secrets," Jack almost seemed to be teasing.

The thought had never even crossed Christina's mind. She was kind of stunned Jack had considered it.

"I haven't had so much as a civil conversation with you in more than two years," she said. "Why ruin the streak?"

Jack looked at her. "You know I've been giving you a hard time ever since I got here," he told her. "And I've spent pretty much the last year and a half to make your life at the hospital difficult. Now for the first time since I've known you, you leave your shift early and according to Joe you've spent the last three and a half hours here not drinking. I come here to see how you're doing – much against my will – and you talk to me in an almost amicable fashion. In my experience, there are only two reasons why a person would radically change that much. Either they've been diagnosed with a fatal disease or they're about to move to a different job."

"Which are you hoping for me?" Christina said, deadpan.

Jack didn't answer for nearly two minutes.

"Jack?"

"I'm thinking it over," he finally said.

Despite herself, Christina found herself smiling. "I guess when you ask a guy named Jack that kind of question an answer like that is inevitable."

"And seriously, Yang," Jack said. "After everything I went through with Stevens and Karev, I've had my quota of young colleagues dying on me for a very long time. I realize it is a possibility in our profession, it doesn't mean I openly root for it, even among people I dislike."

Christina grew serious. "I am sorry, but you did bring up the subject."

"Which was in bad taste on my part," Jack acknowledged. "So please tell me you've gotten a job offer you're considering."

"I have been offered a job. How seriously I'm considering it…" She trailed off.

"I've known you to be many things. Indecisive is not one of them." Jack said. "In order for you not to jump at a career advancement, one of the part time obligations would be the equivalent of working for the Mafia part time."

"For all I know that may be in the fine print," Yang said seriously. "I'm not sure how much trouble I could get into just by going into detail, but I'm not qualified to make this decision without input."

"You don't think I'd tell you to take just to get rid of you?" Jack asked.

Christina shook her head. "You may be self-righteous, but you're not petty. If you thought that someone was doing something even potentially dangerous, you'd tell them regardless of your feelings." She hesitated. "That is why you came down on the five of us so hard."

Jack blinked. "I should have known. All your friends managed to change their ways, but you're the first one to acknowledge why I did in the first place."

"I always was the smartest." Christina said. "But not the most reasonable of them."

"What's the opportunity?" Jack asked.

"Something that could put me on the cutting edge of medical science. An opportunity that would be free of all of the restrictions and red tape and regulations that all of us chafe against," Christina said. "But to sign on, I may have to for all accounts and purposes leave Seattle, cut off ties from everyone here, and they may never know why I'm doing it."

Jack shook his head. "Whoever recruited you did their homework. As far as I know, you're the only person at the entire hospital who actually would be considering this as a realistic possibility."

Christina nodded. "I think I've spent the last few hours not only considering taking the offer as I have why I'd consider it in the first place."

Jack was quiet. "You know that I'm the only attending at this hospital whose made it public knowledge that he won't make a play for Richard's job when he retires. You ever ask yourself why?"

"I thought given everything that happened to you that career advancement didn't matter as much as it would to most doctors," Christina said.

"That's true, but it's not the whole story." Jack sighed. "Okay, in order for me to give you career advice, I have to tell you some details about what happened after the crash. I'm going to spare you what actually happened and just put it in broad strokes as it relates to this. You ever get curious as to details, let me know."

"If it helps us both, fine," Christina said.

Jack nodded. "When people like us are in a situation like this, however moderated or extreme, our training kicks in. I'd never been at the sight of anything like the plane crash, but I followed my instincts and I started pulling people out of wreckage, setting their wounds, and trying to help those I could. Like anyone of us, I compartmentalized everything else and focused on the trauma at hand. That included waited until I was done to focus on my own injuries."

Christina nodded.

"When rescue did not immediately come, more and more people focused on me to tell them what to do. I didn't want the responsibility, and to be clear, there were other survivors who were more qualified and might well have done a better job going forward than I did. But over the next few days as it became clear that rescue wasn't coming, I ended up taking on the role even though I didn't want it." Jack hesitated. "In hindsight, I should have followed my first instincts."

"Why?" Christina asked.

"Because I was terrible at it," Jack said. "I kept making unilateral decisions for everyone, and any time some challenged me on it – no matter how reasonable or logical they were - I dug in and refused to listen. I ignored people's advice no matter how much merit it had, I withheld information and would recoil when anyone decided to the same from me, and I demanded unquestioned loyalty no matter how bad my decisions were." He shook his head. "More than once I was told that I should just be the doctor and let other people do at what they were best. And I ignored them, partly because I thought it was my responsibility but because I just couldn't let anyone else tell me what to do. And as a result, I have a lot of blood on my hands."

"So you're telling me that you realized you were a lousy leader under the worst possible conditions anyone could ever be forced to endure, and figured you'd be lousy at it even under less serious settings," Christina assumed.

"It says a lot about where I was that you consider our job 'less serious'," Jack agreed. "However, I also came to some other realizations. It is very difficult to give orders. You want to know what's even harder? Following them."

Christina nodded with no guile at all. "I had so much trouble as an intern. I know that we all have to do this in order to get to where we have to, but that didn't mean that every time Bailey or Derek or anyone else told me to do something, I didn't feel like I was surrendering somehow."

"I think we've now reached a critical question, Yang. Which do you think you can do better: give orders or follow them? Because no matter where you land – chief resident, head of surgery at this hospital or elsewhere, whatever this job you're considering – you're going to have to do one or the other. You might be doing everything in your power to isolate yourself from the rest of Seattle Grace, but I'm pretty sure somewhere in med school you learned that no one can successfully do any major medical procedure on their own."

"I am aware of that. Painfully so." Yang hesitated. "I've been in charge of my own group of interns for the last year and I don't even think I know any one of their names. Not exactly the hallmark of someone who wants to be a great leader, is it?"

"Some might say it was because you were concentrating on your residency and becoming a great surgeon." Jack said. "Some might say that you were so self-involved you can't even be bothered to learn the names of the people who were in the same position you were just a year before."

"And I'm guess which one of those 'some' you'd come down on," Christina said sheepishly.

"Of course because they're technically your inferiors they will shut up and take your abuse. Other people won't be so generous. Time for another story about my time as leader."

"You don't have to warn me," Christina said.

"I just want to be prepared if your eyes start to glaze over," Jack said wryly. He turned more serious. "One of the survivors had a piece of wreckage lodged in him. After a day passed it became clear I had to remove it and hope the wound wouldn't get infected. I managed to remove the wreckage, but the wound began to turn septic. I knew the only way I could save him was to see if there was anything resembling antibiotics in the luggage. Which meant I had to go into the fuselage, through the luggage of the dead – while their bodies were decomposing around me."

Christina winced. "I'm not sure which part of that sounds worse."

"While I was going through the luggage, trying very hard to remember my training, I heard a noise. And there was James. He was in the middle of scavenging through the luggage himself, looking for electronics, snack food, odds and ends. Essentially he was doing exactly the same thing I was. And I called him disgusting."

"From what Dr. Carlson tells me, James wasn't planning on sharing with the rest of the group," Christina pointed out,

"He was a different man back then, and there was a part of him that really like making everybody come to him for what they needed," Jack told him. "The two of us spent most of our time after the crash at loggerheads. I looked down on him and he thought I was too upright."

"Wasn't your future wife equivocating between the two of you?"

Jack looked at Yang. "I thought you didn't know anything about what happened after the crash."

Christina looked at him. "You do remember where we work? Everybody knows about everybody else's relationship status whether they want to or not. Besides, Kate broke in to our hospital and talked to your friend James first. I'm not a complete moron."

Jack actually smiled at that. "That was a big part of it, no question. I imagine there might've been a pool at some point as to who she ended up with at the end. God knows he had a tendency to treat her better than I did at times." He grew serious. "But that wasn't the real issue. The major problem we had was that he never followed my orders or really anyone's. James was working through some major issues after the crash – we all were, actually – and part of his was that he seemed to like it when everybody thought of him as the stubborn redneck. I'm pretty sure I had that opinion for a very long time, despite the fact that the books he always had his nose in were pretty heady literature."

Christina looked like she was about to object, then paused. "Well, that is one of the classic desert island scenarios," she said. "You think that's one of the reasons he became a writer?"

"James knows his books and he's pretty good on literary history," Jack admitted. "If he hadn't dropped out of high school, he would have been a hell of an English Professor. He sure as hell has a silver tongue – when he's not using it to give you a nickname. He and I were more alike than we wanted to admit – we were both alpha dogs, neither one of us willing to give an inch. It kind of stunned me that at one point he actually said I was the closest thing he had to a friend. I would never have said that back then."

"I'm still not sure I can go that far, even with Meredith," Christina admitted. "There's a part of me, even now, that feels having any kind of attachment is a weakness, a distraction from my endgame."

"Do you even know what that endgame is?" Jack asked. "Because that's the real question. Because a lot of us really think that you don't have a true endgame, you just have benchmarks towards some fictional one. And each time you get within striking distance of it, you set up another one to push it further back."

"So what are you saying? I need to decide if this opportunity is the endgame?" Christina asked.

"When you have an addiction, many people will find a way to escape dealing with it. Some kind of geographic escape is one of the more common ones."

Christina blinked. "I'm not an alcoholic."

"You know as well as I do that people get addicted to other things besides alcohol or drugs." Jack told them. "Success can have as much of a rush as scotch or heroin. For some people, the dragon they chase is wealth or power. The worst kind of addicts are actually those who take pleasure in the suffering and pain of other human beings. Alcoholism and drug addiction can kill you. But chasing success can isolate you emotionally just as much as pursuing your next fix will."

"You're telling me what, we should all try to be failures?" Christina asked.

Jack shook his head. "No, but I think acknowledging that certain pursuits are as dangerous would help. My addiction, ironically, was being able to step and fix things. This left me blind to the fact that I often made things worse by trying to and that I needed as much fixing as anyone around me." He sighed. "I know, I'm starting to sound like a self-help guru with cheesy mantras."

"Yes, but I can't deny I don't relate to at least some of what you're saying," Christina admitted. "So as someone who knows addiction as well as I do, have I hit rock bottom yet?"

"That depends on the real reason you're considering this new opportunity." Jack said. "Ask yourself. What's your real reason for doing this? Do you really think this job will bring you everything you want in life? Not just professional success but the emotional fulfillment that you truly seem to believe will come with it? Or is this just some kind of geographic escape where you'll only realize how big a mistake you've made when it's too late to take it back?"

Christina started chuckling. "I should have known better," she said after she finished laughing. "I came here hoping that you would tell me whether or not I was making the right decision. And just like you, you tell me everything but whether I'm making the right decision."

Jack smiled. "You forget, I know who I'm talking too. You're Christina-fricking-Yang. I could have given you my actual opinion or a false one, and either way you'd disregard it. Same as you'd ignore any advice anyone gave you. No one changes Christina Yang's mind. You always do whatever you think is best for you no matter what the fallout or ramifications are for anyone else. The only difference now is that you think don't know what's best for you and you're hoping someone will point in the right direction."

"But I don't know what the best decision is," Christina tried to say.

Jack waved that off. "Of course you do. The reason you're fighting it so hard is because you don't want to admit that you are flesh and blood like the rest of us. I realize that we all compartmentalize to do our jobs – hell, I spent most of my career fighting it. We're all taught that fear is a weakness, and it can be. But sometimes we have to admit that it's okay to be afraid. And sometimes we have to do it for more than just five seconds."

LGLGLG

GREY RESIDENCE

"Christina."

Meredith had known that Christina had left Joe's an hour ago – Jack had called and told her as much. He had not told her what they had discussed and Meredith had not pressed – she had been doubtful when Jack had said he needed to be the one that Christina confided in about her course of action but she had faith that he might know the right thing to say.

But all that said, she still had no idea what Christina would do even now. The possibility that she would turn up on her doorstep unannounced – something she hadn't done in a very long time – hadn't occurred to her.

"Come in," she told her.

Christina did. "Where's McDreamy?"

"Stuck in surgery."

Christina nodded. "You work it out yet?"

"We spent some time in the supply closet."

"You work it out yet?" she repeated.

Meredith took the question seriously. "I think so. The problem was, every so often he still sees me as the intern, not the doctor I am now. He admits that this has been an issue for him, and he knows I have to follow my own path and not just his."

Christina nodded again. "I'm glad."

Meredith couldn't help but raise an eyebrow. "Really? Because as I recall, you've expressed your doubts about this relationship more than once."

"Because I was jealous." Christina said this in such a matter-of-fact tone that it took a moment for Meredith to realize the enormity of what she'd said.

"The last couple of years, how much of this has been about what Preston did to you?" she asked.

"I fought him every inch of the way about our marriage; I'd say he had a right to do what he did," Yang said.

"Leave you at the altar? You're being a lot more generous than I am about it, but fine. Clean out his apartment while you were still at the hospital? Send his mother to announce he wasn't coming back? Cut himself off so completely from you that the next time you heard from him was in a press clipping? We may joke about you being a robot, but you've have to be made out of stone not to be hurt by his treatment of you." Meredith said honestly. "And this is coming from someone who spent three months having an affair with a man who had learn from his wife that he was still married."

Christina was still. "Jack was right about me being wrong to take credit for what I did when Preston was injured. But when I saw that clipping, knowing how he'd gotten there. I wanted to hurt him. Taking credit for his success was the only thing I thought I could do. It was petty and cheap; he'll never know about it and I didn't even feel better haven't done it."

"At least you were hurting," Meredith knelt by her friend. "At least pain is something."

Christina looked sad. "I've been a shitty friend the last year. Hell, I've been a shitty human being."

"Karev would probably tell you that no one could tell the difference," Meredith said. "The thing is, even he could."

"I've been in a dark place for a while," Christina said. "Maybe it's not nearly as bad as you or the rest, but it's been bad. And I've done everything other than face it. Hell, earlier today I was actually considering running away hoping the darkness would be there when I got there."

Meredith hoped her voice wouldn't give anything anyway. "You basically said the same thing a couple of days ago. What's changed?"

"Because I just realized that's exactly what Preston did," Christina said. "I'm not saying that if he'd stayed the two of us could have worked it out, but you and McDreamy went through worse and came out the other side. Karev and Stevens faced death from every conceivable angle, they're still together. Preston just gave up. For over a year, he did everything in his power to show me he loved me, and just when I was finally willing to believe in it, he gave up and left me behind. I've spent more than two years trying to convince everybody at this hospital that it didn't bother me. I threw myself into my job, convincing myself that it was the only thing that mattered. And apparently I've done such a good job that right now everybody thinks that nobody matters to me."

Meredith put her arm around on her friend. "You seriously thought that I didn't give a damn about you anymore?"

"I haven't exactly done much to earn credits for Friend of the Year," Christina reminded him.

"Christina, as you pointed out, I was never a friend." She paused. "I was 'your person.' And there are obligations that go beyond labels like friendship with that title."

Christina heaved something like a watery sigh. "What do I do know?"

"Well, much as you might hate the idea, I imagine there will be some groveling involved," Meredith said, not at all in jest.

"In Karev's case, he might want an actual pound of my flesh," Christina said grimly.

"You're a great surgeon, Yang, you can probably do it with a minimum of scarring," Meredith said jocularly. "We'll come up with a plan, but there's something important we have to do first."

Christina looked up. "And that is?"

Meredith smiled. "Dance it out."

AUTHOR'S NOTES

For those who might not remember Dean Moriarty was the alias that Ben used on many of the passports they found in Ben's 'secret room' in Season 4 (he used it in 'Shape of Things to Come'). I thought he might want to use an old alias for this story. (Dean Moriarty is also the name of the central character in On The Road, another literary alias for Ben.)

Ben is essentially making a variation on the pitch Richard gave to Juliet originally, except he's actually being honest about what actually happened to her after she accepted. This is also of course a variation of what the Dharma Initiative was trying and I couldn't resist the janitor joke in relation to Ben. (He was a workman too.)

I figured the confidentiality agreement might be something Ben would have thrown in if he were recruiting today. Honestly, it might have been an easier way to ensure secrecy than his own methods.

Writing as Christina Yang was a difficult challenge because of my problems with her as a character. I blame this more on the writing and less on the work of Sandra Oh who I truly consider a superb actress.

I decided at the last minute to make Jack the person the group chose to reason with her, precisely because their relationship has been so problematic and because Jack does see some of himself in her.

'I'm thinking it over' is one of the most famous punchlines in history and it was said by Jack Benny. (No I will not tell you what the setup is if you don't already know it. Go online and find it yourself.)

For all Christina's determination to keep herself aloof from all things Oceanic, it's not like she's completely oblivious. At some point, she would have picked up the information about the island love triangle. This is Seattle Grace, gossiping about romantic affairs is exactly what everybody does.

I've actually had that theory in my head for a while and was planning to put in a different fanfic at some point. Power both corrupts and is an aphrodisiac; I think you could argue its an addiction too, and success is as much a part of power.

I really do think Christina was not as cold as the series made her out to be and I honestly do think being left at the altar and as deserted from Preston Burke as the series made her be (Isaiah Washington's forced departure in Season 3 made that a necessity) would have broken someone like her. Given the soap opera quality of Grey's where couples keep coming back together even after they've divorced (this did happen more than once on the show) I really do think if Burke had stayed he and Yang would have worked it out. As psychology for some of her actions, it's an explanation that works both in canon and in the arc of this series of stories.

Only the epilogue remains folks. Read and review.