FINALLY FREE, grey's anatomy

⁵ˣ¹⁷. ⁱ ʷⁱˡˡ ᶠᵒˡˡᵒʷ ʸᵒᵘ ⁱⁿᵗᵒ ᵗʰᵉ ᵈᵃʳᵏ

season five, episode seventeen

"Ryan!"

Lexie Grey tried catching up to her brother who walked faster trying to get away from his sister after finding about her and Mark Sloan's relationship, "Ryan, just stop."

The intern did as said, stopping in his step turning around and facing his sister, "You're dating Mark?" Lexie nods her head, "One of my best friends,"

Lexie went to open her mouth as Ryan stared at his sister, "I just—I can't." He walked away from his half sister who was confused for a second, "What do you mean you can't? You can't what?"

"I can't wait on the sidelines for you to get hurt, Lexie! You're my sister, I'm supposed to—" Lexie looked at her older half brother, "We're going back to this again, I can protect myself, Ryan! I don't need you coddling me."

Ryan ran a hand through his brunette hair, "I know Mark, okay. He—" Lexie shook her head, "I am not twenty anymore, Ryan. I can stand up for myself and see when someone isn't treating me right, I am not a kid."

His eyes searched his sister's, "I just don't want you to get hurt, Lex. Having your heartbroken is the worst feeling." Lexie nods her head, "That's why you never let anyone in anymore." Ryan opened his mouth to say something when instead Lexie's arms came around her brother, "I am gonna be okay. He's not going to hurt me,"

"If he does, I'll punch his pretty boy face again,"

Lexie looked up at her brother seeing the cut near to her brother's eye, "We need to go and figure out this patient X," Ryan looked at his sister, "Dr Bailey got me out of that,"

His pager went off, "I need to go." He smiled sincerely at his sister before walking off in the direction he needed to go in.

____

"What are you doing here? I thought you were with Bailey," Lexie said to her brother who comes into the room and stands next to her, "Dr Grey?"

Lexie smiled, "Patient X, a previously healthy twenty-nine year-old female presented with stable vital signs, a normal physical exam, uh," Lexie said as she walked around, "with symptoms of occasional right upper quadrant pain, nausea, and hallucinations." Lexie presented to her fellow interns, "Head CT, chest X-ray, CBC were normal, but chemistries revealed an elevated LDH."

Dr Izzie Stevens looked at the interns she had, "So, you are this girl's doctor, she comes to you, she's scared, she doesn't know what's wrong, you have to diagnose her." Izzie explained, "What do you do next? What tests do you run?"

"How about a retic count or peripheral smear?"

Ryan shook his head, "That'd be a waste of time," He claimed as some of the interns looked at him as he had his arms crossed, "The CBC was normal, right?" Izzie nods her head to Ryan G's question, "Exactly."

"You said there was abdominal pain, what about an upper GI?" Pierce questioned as Izzie smiled, "Good." Pierce looked smugly at Ryan who rolled his eyes, listening to Izzie, "That is exactly what Patient X's doctor did next." She claimed putting another film up, "What does this tell us?"

Ryan looked at the film, "Whoa, wait. I think I got it." The other Ryan claimed, "Liver enzymes are normal, cardiac workup's negative—"

"If LDH is false positive—" Steve carried on looking at Ryan Spalding, "It's a trick question." The other Ryan stated as Izzie and Ryan both tilt their heads at the assumption, "What?"

Steve looked at Dr Stevens, "She's fine. Patient X is fine." Izzie shook her head, "Patient X is not fine." She repeated to the interns in the film room, "Ok, her SED rate is slightly elevated. Did we check for autoimmune disease?"

"Yea, ANA and CRP were negative too." Ryan Spalding stated as Ryan tried to think about what he think it could be, "At worst, she's got an anxiety disorder. The girl is totally fine." Ryan S stated.

"She is not fine!" Dr Stevens shouted at the interns, "She had hallucinations. She had visual, auditory and tactile hallucinations about her dead fiancée." Ryan bit his bottom lip now knowing that they were talking about Izzie, "She thought she could talk to him and touch him. She is not fine. She is not fine." Izzie repeated.

Ryan and Lexie shared a look, "You're missing something." Izzie stands up from the chair she was sat on, "You're not looking in the right place. Go back and figure out what you were missing." She claimed walking out of the room.

____

"I think I got it."

Izzie nods her head when seeing Ryan stepping forwards, "Go ahead, Dr Grey." Ryan cleared his throat, "Patient X. An elevated LDH was our only clue. Uh, and then we found out that she had enlarged lymph nodes and a suspicious mole, which was biopsied." He claimed to the surgical resident, "Meanwhile, this MRI with contrast showed a met on her right temporal lobe. The biopsy revealed dividing cells."

Izzie stared at Ryan whilst he spoke, "That, coupled with further staging tests, led to our final diagnosis of metastatic melanoma with mets to the liver, skin and brain." He said looking at the surgical resident, who nods her head, "Your prognosis?"

"With chemo and radiation, um, a few months." He said holding his notebook in his hand, "At best." Ryan Spalding then added, "The girl's pretty much toast."

Steve then added, "Survival rate's five percent." Ryan shifted with his hand crossing over his chest, "If I were her, I'd go on a really good vacation." Steve added on as Ryan looked at the blonde surgical resident who moved her eyes down.

"Good job, everybody." Izzie then said turning off the film lights, and taking off the film, "That's it?" Pierce then questioned their resident, "After the last contest, we got a prize." Graziella admitted looking at her surgical resident, "You think every time you diagnose a patient, hand someone a death sentence there's a prize?"

The blonde resident asked them, "The prize is, you didn't screw it up this time. The prize is, you people actually did something right," Ryan looked down, "The prize is, you were doctors today! You are doctors. That is the prize!"