Trama

Meredith faces the repercussions of messing with the medical trial.

The fifth-year residents return for the first day of a year that will make or break their careers: Meredith faces the consequences of tampering with Derek's clinical trial and is terminated at the hospital; April tries to step up to the plate as Chief Resident in the wake of a giant sinkhole in the middle of Seattle; and Cristina and Owen are still at odds over their drastically different feelings for their unborn child.—ABC Publicity

The scenes of Seattle all seem right, but we end up in the living room of some random couple who are arguing.

Cristina is staying with Meredith when her baby wakes up crying. Owen is helping Derek build his house. Lexie can't have sex with Avery while Meredith's "baby from a broken home is in the other room crying," but Avery thinks he can convince her otherwise. Alex and the chief are sleeping in hospital beds, and Alex mocks the chief for snoring. Arizona and Callie show up at the hospital with their super-cute baby. Teddy is super annoying with her baby talk and Arizona explains Teddy's getting laid, so she's really happy. Teddy confirms the sex with Henry is "Earth-shattering."

At the hospital, everyone is running off to a breakfast. Owen gets there just in time to see Cristina saying goodbye to Meredith's baby. He walks away and says nothing. Meredith hands Zola to Derek and asks if they can talk. He leaves, saying he wants to spend time with the baby.

Back to that other couple's house.The wife is urging the husband to stop being choosy with where he can work.

April, the chief resident, is having trouble getting people's attention at the "final day of residency" breakfast. April tries to get Bailey to explain how she got people to listen to her as chief resident, and instead gets a lesson in how to build a breakfast sandwich.

Meredith tells Cristina that Derek won't talk to her. Cristina says she's not exactly in good standing in her own relationship, as Owen won't talk to her, either. She hasn't had the abortion, but says it'll happen that night at 6.

Avery talks to Sloan about plastics. Sloan says he doesn't see it. Sloan says it isn't about Lexie, but then asks about Lexie.

Teddy tells Cristina she knows Cristina would have been relieved if she'd gone to Germany instead of staying in Seattle, but she didn't. She tells Cristina, "If you want to learn, I want to teach."

Arizona tells Alex he's going to have to earn the peds fellowship next year by publishing an article about the kids he brought to the hospital. She tells him he's a pariah because he sold out Meredith and his breath smells.

That random couple is still fighting while the husband drives the wife to work. She demands he stop the car.

The chief talks to Meredith and says the board feels she "disgraced the hospital." He says he did everything he could, but she's fired, effective immediately. "You're no longer a doctor at Seattle Grace."

That random couple is still fighting when the wife starts to get out of the car. The husband says if she gets out he isn't going to chase her. She does.Then the earth shakes and she falls into a sinkhole. He chases her, and he falls in behind her. We see their car fall in as well.

Owen heads out to the site, Meredith tells Cristina, while Alex and Bailey overhear. She's fired. Cristina starts punching Alex. Bailey tells April to control her residents. Meredith tries to help with a patient who comes in via ambulance. Bailey tells her she has to go.

Owen gets to the sinkhole site, which is massive. A paramedic tells him about the couple who are trapped. She explains the husband won't leave without his wife, even though they could get him out.

Bailey asks April for a resident and no one listens to April's requests. Bailey finally calls out to Lexie and says, "You're with me." Lexie goes.

Owen and Callie at the sinkhole are using video and audio technology to communicate with the husband. They're going to have to talk the husband through his wife's amputation.

Cristina gets annoyed with Teddy's questions during a basic procedure.

Meredith finally tracks down Derek in the hospital and tells him she got fired. His response: "What'd you think was going to happen?" He walks away.

Alex goes to the sinkhole. Callie tells him to go back to the hospital even though everyone hates him. They've sent down a kit to the man at the bottom of the sinkhole. He's frightened about cutting his wife's leg off. Alex, looking for something to do, sees a man being lifted into an ambulance. He notices some plastic bracelets around the man's fingers and asks if anybody's seen a kid. He starts to look around and sees a small hand sticking out of the rubble.

The kid is not breathing.

Meredith is filling out some paperwork when a new intern has trouble with a patient. She tries to walk him through the process and finally gets up to take over. Bailey walks in on this and solves the problem. She then explains Meredith was fired and everyone could have been sued if anything happened to the patient because of Meredith. She tells Meredith to "get the hell out of here."

Alex and Owen decide they have to do some kind of incision on the boy's arms to relieve pressure. Owen tells Alex to do it. As blood spills out of the boy's arm, the boy comes to.

The chief tells Bailey he's busy trying to find a spot for Meredith. He asks Bailey to write a recommendation for Meredith for a fellowship. Bailey then goes off and gives the chief an earful of what a letter from her about Meredith would sound like. It's not good, and ends with, "She will most likely tarnish the reputation of you, your doctors and your hospital."

Sloan criticizes Avery's stitches on a patient. Derek then tells Sloan that Meredith was fired. Sloan asks if she's OK. Derek says he doesn't know. They're treating the father of the boy Alex found.

At the hospital, Alex asks April where his patient's father is. She looks at a messy board and doesn't know. Meredith brings April her cases and asks her to reassign them. Cristina encourages Meredith to fight for her job. Then she mocks Teddy for her annoying questions, explaining all of the steps she's going to take to dispose of a bottle of water, and why.

At the sinkhole, Callie is walking the husband through the amputation, telling him he has to put his weight into the first cut. He can't do it. Owen tells him to cover her face, saying it will help. The man follows the directions. He screams as he makes the incision.

He hits bone, then freezes again. Callie tries to tell him he can't stop. Owen says he's going in.

Meredith tells Cristina she's going to be a mom and tries to convince herself it's "a blessing in disguise." Meredith suggests to Cristina maybe she wants to be a mom, too, "and that's why you can't go through with it," referring to the abortion. Cristina says she wishes things were that way, but they aren't. She asks Meredith to be there with her at 6 when she gets the procedure done.

Meredith's case worker comes to visit while Meredith is playing with Zola at the hospital's day care. An attendant lets it slip Derek was scheduled to pick Zola up that day. Meredith tries to play it off. We next see Derek getting a phone call in the O.R. saying the social worker wants to speak with him.

Owen is hoisted to the bottom of the sinkhole and tries to convince the husband he'd done well. Owen makes a big cut and tells the man his wife is free. They'll both be lifted up right behind him. The man is lifted up toward the street surface.

Derek and Meredith talk about the social worker situation. Derek tells Meredith not to talk to her anymore.

Sloan mocks Avery for making another mistake, bringing Sloan to the wrong patient. April then realizes the wrong patient was sent to the O.R. Meanwhile, we see Lexie realizing they're about to cut into the wrong patient. April then bursts into the room and explains. Bailey says nothing, but is clearly furious.

Owen asks Meredith to help him with a patient. She explains she got fired. Meredith then tells Owen that Cristina didn't have the abortion. She gives Owen a lecture about what will happen to Cristina if she has a baby she doesn't want. Meredith says she was the child of a surgeon who didn't want a child. She doesn't want that to happen to Cristina, Owen, or their kid.

April tries to explain to Bailey how sorry she is. Bailey is so furious she can't speak, even though April wants to be yelled at.

Teddy continues to treat Cristina like a first-year, and explains she's doing it because nobody ever did. Teddy explains Cristina is arrogant because she's so good.

The chief is on a phone call trying to defend Meredith. Alex walks in and tells the chief he needs to get Meredith her job back. Alex offers to say he lied and wasn't sure of what he saw. The chief tells Alex this is "not on" him, but Alex thinks it is.

Sloan continues to mock Avery for a bad stitching job he did on the man whose kid was found at the sinkhole.

All of the residents are getting paged by Bailey. Bailey is walking around and finally comes upon the woman whose leg was cut off at the sinkhole. She says, "This is a Gunther." She's been looking for one all day. No one knows what it means, except for Callie.

Janet, the social worker, wants to talk to Meredith and Derek together. Meredith says she should have told her she'd been fired. Meredith goes to find Derek. He's operating on the boy who was found at the sinkhole. We see Meredith walking urgently, but soon realize she isn't going to find Derek. She's carrying Zola and taking off.