A/N: I thought this was too important moment to leave out.

Midway into December found Seattle Grace hospital bustling with activity. A number of attendings took extended vacations leaving the ones left behind to wrangle a group of residents who all fought for whatever surgeries they could get.

The hospital was decorated tastefully to try and bring a little cheer to those spending the holiday season within. The peds ward had different activities to try and remind the kids there was life going on outside the treatments and surgeries they had to endure.

On the sixteenth of December, Carlos Torres brushed the snow off his shoulders while walking up to the front desk.

"Can I help you?" The young woman smiled up at him.

"I'm here for Dr. Calliope Torres, will you page her for me?" Carlos asked.

"Can I ask who you are?" She asked.

"Carlos Torres, I'm her father," Carlos explained with a stern expression.

The receptionist paged Callie to the front desk as he asked. She knew it was unusual to do so but the stern look she was getting made her nervous.

"Daddy?" Callie said when she came down after about a ten minute wait.

"Calliope," Carlos stood up from the seat had took while waiting. "Your mother told me you canceled on us for Christmas. I was in Vancouver for business when she told me. Are you alright?"

"I'm fine, Daddy." Callie tensed slightly. She was hoping to put off her father finding out about both her finding her soulmate and finding out who her soulmate was for a while still. But six weeks turned out to be as long as they could extend it. "I was asked to go home with my soulmate."

"You found your soulmate," Carlos looked shocked. "When did this happen?"

Callie shifted a bit on her feet as she thought of what to say. "They turned twenty-seven about six weeks ago and messaged me. We started talking back and forth and figured it out. They work here with me."

Carlos nodded as he took the information in. "Well, I'd like to meet his young man who happens to be my daughter's soulmate."

"Daddy," Callie breathed out slowly. "Hold on a minute." She fished her glass tipped pen out and wrote on her forearm.

My father just showed up out of the blue and wants to meet you. - C

I'm about to go into surgery in OR 3. Will he be around in about two hours? - A

"They are about to go into surgery," Callie explained to her father. "What if we go get a cup of coffee and talk?"

Carlos gestured for Callie to lead him toward wherever they could get coffee. "Tell me about this soulmate of yours, Calliope. If you work together you must know them well enough by now."

"They are a resident," Callie smiled. It was impossible for her to think of Arizona and not smile these days. "Really great at their job, funny, they treat me incredibly well. Their father is a Marine officer and their mom illustrates children's books. They have a brother in the Army."

"They sound like a fine young man," Calie said as they stepped on the elevator. "Are they aware of your family background?"

"You mean the family business?" Callie snorted while reaching to hit the button for the cafeteria. "We haven't had a big talk about my trust fund or anything like that, no."

"These are important things for them to understand," Carlos chided a bit.

"It's only been six weeks, Daddy. We'll have the big talks, but I want to just get through Christmas and into January before I pull out the family stuff," Callie promised. Though how did you tell someone that you had a trust fund to your name that would blow most people's mind?

Carlos denoted his dissatisfaction in not commenting. He leaned back against the wall of the elevator with his arms crossed over his chest.

"Daddy," Callie said as the pair stepped out of the elevator and headed to the cafeteria. "We've only know each other as soulmates for a few weeks. I don't want to drop the "hey I'm old family money and Miami royalty" before Christmas when I'm going to see their family."

"You are aware that your trust fund is now fully accessible to you?" Carlos asked as he and Callie walked. "Yours and Aria's both were set up so when you turned 18 you were given access to 20% of it. When you finished college you gained access to 50% of it. Med school for you and law school for Aria got you both to 80%. And now that you've both found your soulmates you have 100% of it, as does she. That is no small sum of money, Calliope."

"Aria and Raul are very happy." Callie turned to her father as they stood in line. "Daddy, I know it isn't a small sum, and I know what I'm entitled to. I did send an email to the money guy you recommended to try and get everything sorted and take some out. But right now I'm more focused on my next surgery than how many 0's my account has." She tried to keep her voice down to make sure that they weren't overheard by too many people. This was not something she wanted out.

Carlos sighed but nodded. They both ordered their coffees and then got in line to pay. "I am very proud of you becoming a doctor."

"But you wish I worked for the company like Aria does?" Callie filled in for him.

"I wish you took a more active roll," Carlos corrected. "Aria is well on her way to making it possible for me to retire with how she's handling her roll."

"I am a doctor," Callie reminded him. "I hated the business classes I took in college. I want to spend the next forty years breaking bones and healing people. Not deciding where hotels go and overseeing growth potential in new markets."

"If it makes you happy, then it makes me happy, you know that," Carlos said what he always said.

"I really hope you mean that," Callie said as they moved up in line.

"I have always been proud of you. You're my little girl. When you used to sit on my lap and look up with me, I only ever wanted you to find happiness," Carlos said sincerely. "You are my daughter, Calliope. What father doesn't want happiness for their child?"

Callie paid for their coffee before walking her father away from the cafeteria. She didn't tell him where they were going as they lead them to the gallery for OR 3. She sat them in and best and held her coffee between her hands as a grounding point.

"The person with their back to us is Arizona Robbins. She's the most beautiful woman I've ever seen in my life, Daddy. She has these bright blue eyes and this super magic smile that lifts me up when I feel like I can't keep going. She's kind and funny and so smart. No one I've ever been with has treated me like she does. She's going to save kids - tiny humans is what she calls them - and she is going to be so good at it. Arizona is my soulmate, Daddy. She's my soulmate, and she makes me so happy."

Carlos sat there in stunned silence. While he knew there was always a chance either Aria or Callie's soulmates were people who might not be what he expected, he had never questioned they would be men. And here was his little girl telling him that a woman was her soulmate? It had to be some sort of mistake.

"You wanted me to find happiness," Callie went on when her father didn't say anything. "You always told me one day God would bring my soulmate into my life, and I would just feel different. I would feel them in everything I did. I would touch my hand to theirs and feel this warmth fill my chest. I would want a life with them that would make us both so happy. Well, God brought her to me and me to her. And I hold her hand and I feel this indescribable warmth in my chest. I want a life with her. I want a family with her."

Callie pulled a chain out from under her scrub top where her claddagh ring was during the day when she worked. "This was a gift from Arizona's brother. It's something their family does. I wear this and she wears her own. And when I look down at our right hands I picture the day we'll move them to our left. Because I'm going to marry her one day. And when I do, I am going to want my dad to walk me to her."

Carlos shifted in his seat as he looked down at the woman that Callie was talking about. He had little idea what was going on, but he could tell the woman was running the show as much as the older man standing across from her. But she was a she and Carlos could not get past that yet.

"What would you like me to say, Calliope?" Carlos whispered.

"Say that you aren't going to treat Arizona like she did something wrong by being my soulmate. Say you won't treat me differently for being hers," Callie whispered in a small voice. "Say that you still love me. Say you're still proud of me."

Tears fell down Callie's face as Carlos stood up from his seat and walked out. She set her coffee by her feet before she wrapped her arms around herself. She leaned her head forward and rocked slightly before feeling a pair of arms wrapped around her.

"I saw your dad walk out looking pissed," Addison said as she held on to Callie.

"He walked out after I told him about Arizona," Callie turned to hug Addison as tightly as she could with the arms of the chairs in the way.

Addison couldn't tell Callie it would be alright because she didn't know if it would. So, instead she just held on to her friend and made sure that she knew there would be people in her life that supported her, that loved her, and that weren't going to walk away from her. She felt tears soak into her scrub top, but paid no attention to it.

"He always said meeting my soulmate would be one of the best moments of my life," Callie sniffled. "And it was. It has been. Arizona is everything I could want."

"Give him some time," Addison whispered. "Sometimes people, fathers, just need a little time."

"I hope so," Callie pulled back when her pager went off. "Fuck, this is the pit. I have to go, MVA ten minutes out."

"Go. It'll take your mind off everything." Addison stood when Callie did. She pulled Callie into a tight hug before sending her down to the pit to clear her head with a car crash.

/

Arizona sang under her breath as she scrubbed out. She knew Callie's dad was here and it made her blood run a bit cold but her mood from that surgery she just rocked won out for the moment. She turned her head when she saw Addison walk into the scrub room.

"Good afternoon," Arizona said cheerfully.

"Callie's dad is here and he did not take you being a woman well," Addison warned without preamble. "I don't know how much she'd told you about him, but he's old school Cuban Catholic. Old family, old school ideas about some things. The two of them are very close."

"Damnit," Arizona grabbed a cloth and dried her hands.

"She's in surgery now, but I wanted you to have a heads up. Because she is going to be a mess about this, and I don't want you blindsided," Addison said.

Arizona tossed the cloth into the bin before crossing her arms over her chest. She bowed her head as she tried to think of the right words for this. "I am in love with her. Six weeks in and I want to make it sixty years more. The power of this bond, the way it enhances everything, is so much more than I expected. How do I make this better for her?"

"Be there for her," Addison said. She knew it wasn't the most enlightened advice, but it was all she had. "Callie is a process out loud kind of person. Sometimes English, sometimes Spanish. So, just be there for her and let her process. Let her vent and let her say things she doesn't mean. Hold her and rub her back and be there."

"Thank you." Arizona let her hands drop to her sides as she took a breath. "Is he still here?"

"Carlos?"

"Yes."

"He's in the lobby the last I saw him. But be careful, Robbins," Addison warned.

"I was raised by a Marine. Carlos Torres doesn't scare me," Arizona lied through her teeth.

The walk down to the lobby felt a little too much like a march toward her own demise. She felt drawn to go talk to the man that had hurt her soulmate. The problem was that made was also said soulmate's father. A man that Callie talked to every Sunday. A man who Callie said she was more like than her mother. Her soulmate's hero.

She looked around the lobby and found who had to be Carlos Torres standing looking out at the grey sky. She stepped next to him wordlessly and gave a tight smile.

"You're her then?" Carlos asked. "Arizona Robbins?"

"I am, sir," Arizona nodded.

Carlos shifted his weight like Callie always did when she was in a situation she didn't control, but wanted to try and figure out how to. Arizona could see features of Callie in his face, in his movements. It settled her and unnerved her in the same breath.

"I don't know you well enough to talk about her. We're not gonna do that," Carlos said after a moment of looking out at the sky. He took a half step away from her as a dismissal.

"Most people think I was named for the state, but it's not true. I was named for a battle ship. The U.S.S. Arizona." Arizona looked up at the sky and thought of her own grandfather up there in his Navy uniform giving her the fortitude to do this. "My grandfather was serving on the Arizona when the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor, and he saved nineteen men before he drowned."

Arizona breathed in and she saw the gravestone in a field of stone that made up Arlington. His body had been recovered, and he had been buried a hero with a Medal of Honor to his name. "Pretty much everything my father did his whole life was about honoring that sacrifice. I was raised to be a good man in a storm. Raised me to love my country. To love my family. To protect the things I love."

Carlos looked over when Arizona said the word love. His eyes narrowed, but he allowed her to go on wordlessly.

"When my father - Colonel Daniel Robbins, the United States Marine Corp - heard that I was a lesbian, he said he had only one question. I was prepared for, 'How fast can you get the hell out of my house?' But instead, it was, 'Are you still who I raised you to be?' My father believed in country the way that you believe in God. And my father is not a man who bends, but he bent for me, because I'm his daughter. I'm a good man in a storm."

Carlos closed his eyes at the way Arizona's father had handled his own daughter when he left his seated after the news. But how could his Calliope be the soulmate to a woman? What had she done to displease God? What had he?

"I love your daughter." Arizona told Carlos before she had even told Callie. "And I protect the things that I love. Not that I need to. She doesn't need it. She's strong, and caring, and honorable. She's who you raised her to be." Her voice was thick with emotion in thinking of the wonderful woman Calliope was.

Carlos looked from Arizona to the sky and back again. Calliope was strong, and caring, and honorable. That was who he raised her to be. But he also raised her to follow their faith. But was this not God's will?

"Merry Christmas, Mr. Torres," Arizona said softly before walking away from him.

/

Callie was in her apartment that night, trying to forget about everything, but the reality TV she was watching. She loved her father, but she couldn't change who her soulmate was even if he didn't approve. And being with Arizona for the last few weeks has been like a blast of fresh air.

When there was a knock on the door, Callie grabbed her wallet and headed to pay for the pizza she ordered. When she opened the door, "it wasn't the pizza guy standing there but her father.

"Daddy?"

"May I come in?" Carlos asked.

Wordlessly Callie moved back, so her father could step inside of her apartment. She tossed her wallet on the stand next to the door and shoved her hands in her hoody pocket.

"I spoke with Dr. Robbins this afternoon," Carlos said as he looked around Callie's apartment. "Well, she spoke, and I mostly stood there."

"Arizona likes a speech," Callie said softly.

Carlos looked down before taking in and letting out a long breath. "I am not going to pretend I understand why she's your soulmate or pretend that I am happy about it, but I also believe that God knows things I will never understand."

"What does that mean, Daddy?" Callie asked as she fidgeted a bit.

"It means that I expect from her what I would expect from any soulmate of yours. I expect her to take care of you, support you, and to treat you well," Carlos said as he lifted his head to look at his daughter.

"Really?" Callie asked as a shy smile slowly spread across her face.

"You are my little girl. I don't want to be cut out of your life or cut you from mine," Carlos whispered.

Callie stepped forward and wrapped her arms around him as a few tears leaked from her eyes. "Thank you, Daddy. I love you," she whispered against his shoulder.

"I love you too, Calliope," Carlos whispered back. "You will always be my little girl."

Callie pulled back and wiped at her eyes. "I ordered some pizza, and Arizona was coming over after work, do you want to stay?"

"I can't. I have to be to London for a meeting in the morning, but I didn't want to leave Seattle with things the way they were," Carlos explained as he straightened his coat.

"Thank you," Callie said, leaning in and hugging him again.

"Thank you for letting me," Carlos said before kissing her cheek.