Going, Going, Gone

"Dying changes everything. There is the emotional fall out, sure. But there's also the practical stuff. Who's going to do your job? Who is going to take care of your family? The only good thing for you is you don't have to worry about it. People you never know will be living in your house, working your job. The world just keeps on going. Without you.They say death is hardest on the living. It’s tough to actually say goodbye. Sometimes it’s impossible. You never really stop feeling the loss. It’s what makes things so bitter sweet. We leave little bits of ourselves behind, little reminders. A lifetime of memories, photos, trinkets. Things to remember us by even when we're gone."

- Meredith Grey

Going, Going, Gone is the Season 9 premiere and the 173rd overall episode of Grey's Anatomy.

Short Summary
Months after the plane crash, the doctors at Seattle continue to try and find a new sense of normalcy. With a new set of interns to put through the ringer, the new fellows and attendings get used to their roles while Cristina adjusts to her new life in Minnesota. But Mark's life hangs in the balance and it's clear that Seattle Grace Mercy West Hospital is not the same.

Full Summary
"Dying changes everything," says Meredith's voiceover as we see an unfamiliar face walking through the hospital's halls. She talks about how other people will be hired to take your place. This new young doctor has a walking-and-talking conversation with another newbie, much the way Meredith and Cristina have for years. But these two doctors stop short when they see Bailey and Meredith. They're scared of one of them it's Meredith.

Meredith barks out orders to this newbie, and Bailey is impressed. Bailey asks about Cristina and Meredith says Cristina "loves" Minnesota.

We see Cristina in the freezing cold outside her hospital talking to her new boss. She's annoyed by having to listen to the guy tell some story about an operation he once performed.

Derek sits alone and Webber tells him "we're all set for tonight." It isn't clear what they're talking about, but it's going to happen at 5 o'clock.

Ben surprises Bailey by showing up from UCLA. They head for an on-call room to mess around, but it's occupied. Alex is in there with someone, talking about how he would like to put off Hopkins to spend more time with her, but he can't.

Callie is annoyed with people staring at her. Callie shows Derek some scans of a patient with a spinal cord issue and she's surprised that he's going to perform the surgery with her. He insists it's no big deal. We next see Meredith telling Derek "it is a big deal." He insists he needs to do it "especially today."

Callie talks to Sloan, who's in a coma, and tells him that Derek is going to operate today with his brand-new hand. She asks Sloan if it's going to work. He obviously doesn't respond. Derek walks in. They both notice it's seven hours until 5 o'clock, and we now know what the deadline is about. Derek says Sloan's directive was very clear: If after 30 days there were no signs of recovery, he wanted to be let go.

"That's all we're doing," Derek tells Callie. "Honoring his wish."

Callie leans down and tells Sloan it's so hot in the room she's going to take her shirt off. No response, no increase in his heart rate.

Derek looks at Sloan and says, "You always had to be the first."

We flash back to 1994, where Sloan is serving as Derek's best man and telling him that even though Addison is great, God didn't intend for a man to be with one woman forever. Sloan tells Derek he'll "never, ever find another friend as good as me."

We're back in 2007, where Sloan is setting up a camera to record himself having sex with Callie, but she tosses a pillow at it and the recording stops.

We're back in 2012, where Bailey and Webber reveal to Meredith that the residents call her "Medusa." Bailey assures Meredith to "take if from 'the Nazi,' it's good to be feared."

In Minnesota, Cristina goes to another doctor and asks if she can perform her surgery without Dr. Thomas, because he talks too much. The boss tells her she has to do it. Cristina has a Skype-like call with Meredith and tells her that her surgery was pushed to a later time, so she has to push her flight to Seattle. Meredith and Hunt both think Cristina isn't going to get on the flight because she isn't ready to fly again.

At lunch, Alex is talking about how he's been "saying goodbye" to his intern fan club all day. He tells Avery he needs to step up and take advantage of the perks of being an surgery fellow, noting that Avery hasn't "banged anybody since Lexie." The conversation freezes and Alex casually apologizes. Avery meekly says, "I have banged people."

Meredith walks over to the table of interns. They're freaked out by her presence. She announces that one of them will get their first surgery, an appendectomy, for having shown the most promise. She gives it to Dr. Wilson (the one we saw first), who does a spit take and thanks Meredith, who says nothing.

Derek and Callie are going over scans for their surgery, and Callie looks at Derek's surgically repaired hand. He tells her she did a great job and he's fine. Hunt walks in and introduces the new pediatrics surgeon. The guy tells her he's sorry, that he heard about her wife, and she tells him thank you. He and Hunt leave, and Callie tells Derek not to make a big deal. We next see Callie sobbing in a supply room. Alex bursts in with an intern he's hooking up with, but they hear Callie crying, and the intern leaves. Alex asks Callie if she's OK and she tells him to get out. He closes the door, but stays inside silently while Callie cries some more.

We flash back to 2010, where Sloan is having Avery record a procedure. Back in 2012, Avery is reading Sloan case files.

Cristina and Meredith have another video chat while Cristina is watching Dr. Thomas perform a surgery that she is none-too-impressed by. Another doctor in the gallery tells Cristina to take her conversation outside because he's trying to take notes, but she tells him there's nothing to learn. Cristina tells Meredith that Hunt emailed her and wanted to make sure she had people around her that night. She says she doesn't know why anyone is so worked up about 5 o'clock.

Ben and Bailey are making out in an on-call room when an intern knocks on the door. Bailey tells him to slide the file under the door so she can review it. She tells the intern what to do and slides it back under the door, but she's upset to hear the other interns laughing about her being "at it again." She opens the door and they scatter.

Alex meets the new head of pediatrics and boasts about the program where they brought in 32 orphans from five countries for treatment. The new guy says it was impressive work but it doesn't fit his agenda and he's asked UCLA to take over the program. Alex is speechless.

Derek enters the O.R. and gets a round of applause from everyone inside. Everyone waits quietly and Callie tells Derek he has to say it. Derek pauses for a moment, takes a breath and says, "It's a beautiful day to save lives."

Meredith is in surgery with her intern doing the work while the others watch from the gallery and talks about Meredith being "Medusa" and "a demon." Meredith doesn't react at first, but glances up and one of them says, "It's like she can hear us." Hunt lets them know that the red light means the intercom is on, and they all panic and sit up straight when Hunt tells them to.

In his surgery, Derek drops a clamp. Callie's eyes get wide, but no one says anything. Derek flexes his hand and tells Callie that the standby surgeon should take over. She tells him to just take a moment, but he walks away.

We cut back to 2009 and see Sloan at a wedding congratulating Callie and Arizona on their wedding. The cameraman asks Sloan who he'd want to be with forever and Sloan says, "That easy Lexie Grey."

Back in 2012, Alex tells Callie about the new ped guy's plan to ditch the orphan program. She tells him it's not a good time. She tells him she doesn't really care about his peds program, adding, "Sometimes things die and there's nothing you can do about it."

In her surgery, Dr. Wilson Meredith's intern gets the appendix out successfully, but makes a mistake soon after and the patient starts bleeding out. She freezes and Meredith nudges her aside to fix it.

In Minnesota, Cristina stands up to Dr. Thomas and tells him he can't take her surgery. He's welcome to back-seat drive, but he can't take the surgery away.

Callie finds Derek and tells him neither of them should have been in surgery, given that they're so emotional. Derek tells her his hand went numb in there, and kicks a table over. Webber walks in and tells them it's almost 5.

Avery is talking to Sloan and tells him that while he's taught him a lot, he thinks he knows what he's doing now. "The Plastics Posse is going to live on," Avery says, "because I can take it from here." Avery walks out and Webber, Callie and Derek walk in.

Webber tells them what he's going to do, warning them that their brains can't comprehend what's about to happen but he wants to give them a chance to catch up.

In Minnesota, Cristina looks up at the clock and sees it's 7, meaning it's 5 in Seattle, which she tells Dr. Thomas. He says it's also 4 a.m. in Moscow and 8 a.m. in Singapore. She says nothing and keeps operating.

Webber says Sloan's final request was that :only comfort care be given to him in his final moments." He says once the cord is removed Sloan could only hold for a few moments or several hours. He turns the ventilator off and says Sloan's been sedated with morphine, so he's not feeling any of this. Webber removes the tube, then leaves to give Derek and Callie some privacy.

Meredith and Avery sit next to each other in the hall outside of Sloan's room, saying they tried so hard in the woods thinking they could do something if they could get him back to Seattle alive. She gets up and says she can't stay. She's going to the airport to see Cristina.

Hunt runs into Dr. Wilson, who is crying in another hallway. Hunt tells her the surgery was designed for her to fail. She asks him why Meredith is so mean. "Is it that plane crash?" she asks. She says she heard about it, they were stranded in the woods for a week, "people died, or almost died, or something." Hunt mockingly repeats what she just said. He gets kind of upset, and tells her that Meredith isn't mean, she's strong. He tells her that Meredith won't go easy on her because that would be a disservice to her. He tells her that it's her own job to fix things other people and if she can't handle that, she should leave now. "It not, don't stand around in hallways and cry. Cry somewhere else, where I won't see you," he tells her.

Cristina visits the boss and he says he's asked Dr. Thomas to help her around. He tells her that on this hospital's yard stick, she's not thriving. He says there are no superstars there, because they work as a team. He tells her to take a few days and see the lakes and visit the Mall of America. He tells her to "soften up those sharp Seattle edges." It's a mandatory "R&R" period, starting immediately.

It's getting later and Sloan is still hanging on while more doctors gather around. Bailey is one of them, and he asks Webber about her nickname with the residents. Webber tells her only that she's been happy lately and her happiness seems to coincide with Ben's arrival. Webber says that's all he's going to say because he's a gentleman, and he doesn't want to say anymore. Avery snickers. Alex says he'll tell her, but only because he's about to walk out of the hospital forever. Her nickname is "BCB: Booty-call Bailey."

Meredith sits at the airport and sees Alex. She confronts him about not saying goodbye. She tells him that Sloan is dying and everyone's leaving, but Alex says he can sit around being the guy who should've been on the plane that crashed. He tells her he should've left three months ago, Hopkins won't wait and he can't stay in Seattle just because Meredith doesn't want to be alone. She walks away and Alex gets bumped from behind by someone he doesn't seem to recognize as Hunt, who's racing to catch a flight somewhere.

Back in Sloan's room, Callie and Derek are still sitting and watching his monitor. The look at each other as his heart rate starts to drop. It finally goes flat and they both cry. We see one more video from Sloan's past, but there's no date. He's holding his baby daughter and shushing whoever is taking the video.

We see Meredith on a plane headed to Rochester, Minn. She starts to shake and demands that the flight attendant let her off.

We next see Cristina telling Meredith on a video chat that she had the boarding pass in her hand but couldn't get on the plane. Meredith is drinking at the bar and agrees that they'll have to get over this some time. Alex shows up and sits next to Meredith, apologizing for the way he acted earlier. He says he has to stay because the new guy is going to mess everything up. "Besides, I don't even like Baltimore," he adds. He says he couldn't get on his plane.

He tells Cristina on the video chat, "When Hunt lands, tell him I'm staying." Cristina's confused, but Alex says he saw Hunt at the airport and assumed he was headed to see her.

The next morning, we see Hunt visiting April on a farm. She's literally walking a pig. He tells her Sloan died and he wants her to come back to work at the hospital. He says he keeps looking for the "do-overs," and the fact that he should've never taken her job from her is one thing he can fix. He tells her she doesn't belong on a farm, she belongs in Seattle saving lives.

We see Callie in her apartment, and she opens a door where Arizona is laying in bed with her back turned to the door. Callie tells Arizona to get up and "snap out of this; if not for me, then for Sofia because she lost a parent last night and I lost my best friend, and I will be damned if I lose you, too."

Arizona angrily replies, "Snap out of it? Snap out of this?" She reveals her amputated leg, saying, "How the hell am I supposed to snap out of this when you cut off my leg?" Callie says nothing and walks away, slamming the door.

Once last video: Arizona is trying to get a take picture of Callie and Sloan holding baby Sofia, but the camera is on video. Sloan turns the camera around and says, "Oh, I got it." And we get one last picture of Sloan.

Main cast

 * Ellen Pompeo as Dr. Meredith Grey
 * Sandra Oh as Dr. Cristina Yang
 * Justin Chambers as Dr. Alex Karev
 * Chandra Wilson as Dr. Miranda Bailey
 * James Pickens Jr. as Dr. Richard Webber
 * Sara Ramírez as Dr. Callie Torres
 * Eric Dane as Dr. Mark Sloan
 * Kevin McKidd as Dr. Owen Hunt
 * Jessica Capshaw as Dr. Arizona Robbins
 * Sarah Drew as Dr. April Kepner
 * Jesse Williams as Dr. Jackson Avery
 * Patrick Dempsey as Dr. Derek Shepherd

Guest stars

 * William Daniels as Craig Thomas
 * Jason George as Dr. Ben Warren
 * Steven Culp as Dr. Parker
 * Gaius Charles as Dr. Shane Ross
 * Philip Casnoff as Dr. Mel Barnett
 * Camilla Luddington as Dr. Jo Wilson
 * Tina Majorino as Dr. Heather Brooks
 * Jerrika Hinton as Dr. Stephanie Edwards
 * Tessa Ferrer as Dr. Leah Murphy

Co-Starring

 * Dan Gordon as Flight Attendant
 * Brian Houtz as Resident
 * Arriane Alexander as Gate Attedant
 * Ursula Burton as ER Nurse
 * Mackenzie and Madelyn Bicknell as Baby Sofia
 * Lynn Alana Delaney as Nurse Tucker

Notes and Trivia

 * This episode's title originated from the song Going, Going, Gone, originally sung by Bob Dylan.
 * This episode scored 11.73 million viewers.
 * This episode takes place three months after the plane crash which is confirmed by Karev in the airport.
 * It also takes place 30 days after the events shown in Remember the Time, as Mark is taken off of life support after this period of time.
 * There's a glitch when Meredith is writing on the OR board. In the first shot, her name is already on the board, Jo Wilson's is not. In the next shot, Jo's name is on the board, and Meredith's name disappeared.
 * This is the first episode to show the black Grey's Anatomy opener since season 2.
 * We are led to believe Arizona also died in the crash until the last few minutes of the episode.

Quotes

 * Mark: You will never, ever find another friend as good as me.


 * Jackson (to Mark): I really think I know what I'm doing. Plastic Posse is going to live on, I can take it from here.


 * Alex (to Meredith): I'm not going to stay in Seattle just because you don't want to be alone.


 * Owen (to April): I should have helped you be strong instead of kicking you when you were down. You don't belong here, on a farm. You belong in Seattle, saving lives.


 * Callie: Get Up! Get the hell out of bed and snap out of this because Sofia lost a parent and I lost my best friend.
 * Arizona: Snap out of this?! How the hell am I supposed to snap out of this when you cut off my leg?


 * Owen: Dr. Grey isn't mean. She is strong.


 * Meredith: They say death is hardest on the living. It's tough to actually say goodbye. Sometimes it's impossible. You never really stop feeling the loss. It's what makes things so bittersweet.