(This story contains spoilers from Grey’s Anatomy season 21, episode eight, “Drop It Like It’s Hot.”)

Grey’s Anatomy had bid farewell to another series regular.

Midori Francis surgical intern Mika Yasuda scrubbed into Seattle’s Gray Sloan Memorial Hospital for the last time Thursday, after joining the show at the start of Season 19.

The eighth episode of season 21 — also the fall finale of the hit ABC medical drama, returning March 6, 2025 — picked up after Jake Borelli’s Dr. Levi Schmitt also resigned Grey’s Anatomy. Yasuda’s younger sister, Chloe (Julia Rose Gruenberg), tragically died after a horrific car accident when Yasuda fell asleep at the wheel after pulling an all-nighter at the hospital. The combination of Chloe’s wounds from the accident and the effect of chemotherapy on her body from the treatment for her cancer proved fatal and Chloe died from her injuries.

At the beginning of this week’s episode, “Drop It Like It’s Hot,” Yasuda is seemingly ready to go back to work after taking some time off. Seattle is experiencing a heat wave and Gray Sloan is about to be flooded with patients. When one of these patients begins to code and Bailey (Chandra Wilson) tries to revive him, Yasuda breaks down and starts yelling at his boss.

“It’s not working. You’re losing him. You’re letting him die. Dr. Bailey, he’s dying,” Yasuda tells Bailey, who replies, “Hey! Don’t you think I know that?!” The intern continues: “He is dying. Aren’t you supposed to be a doctor?! He’s dying! You let him die. You just can’t let him die like that. You can’t just let him die. You have to save her. Save her. Just please save her. Just save her please. You have to save her please. Just take me! Dr. Bailey, just take me. Just take me.”

After her breakdown, Yasuda asks colleague Simone (Alexis Floyd) if she will feel this way forever, and Simone, whose mother died in childbirth, tells her that she will but that each passing day will help her to feel a little more comfortable with the loss.

In an attempt to feel “normal”, Mika starts kissing intern Jules (Adelaide Kane), and the two have sex for the first time in an emergency room, in truth Grey’s Anatomy fashion. When Mika starts crying after, she tells Jules that everything in the hospital reminds her of her sister.

Yasuda approaches Bailey to seemingly ask for more time off, which the residence manager is ready to grant her. The two talk about how Bailey still thinks about her mother every day, even though she died three years earlier. But Yasuda ultimately decides that she can’t move on with her life working at the place where she sees her sister everywhere, so she calls to leave.

In the final moments of the episode, Jules sees Yasuda packing up her stuff from the locker and asks her to stay, but the intern says she can’t. They kiss and Yasuda leaves the hospital. When Jules approaches Bailey to see what she said to Mika, Bailey says she told her to do what she needed to do for herself.

After joining the series with the introduction of the new class of trainees in season 19, this episode marks the exit of Midori from Grey’s. Speaking of the goodbye storyline at the beginning of Season 21, show runner Meg Marinis told THR“We really honor how we introduced her character and how far she’s come. Mika is such a fun character to write. She really delivers this season, and I think people are going to be really, really invested in her storyline.” Adding: “I’m really, really happy with how it turned out.”

Borelli, in his exit interview with THR, acknowledged the hole left with both his and Francis’ queer characters leaving the show (Borelli had the series’ first gay male kiss in season 15). “These are two incredibly well-rounded queer characters played by incredible queer people, and it’s going to be hard to fill,” he said. “I don’t know what their plan is. I’m excited to see. I hope they continue to put their shoulders behind queer storylines. It was an interesting summer to go through with Midori, and we’ve talked about it a lot. But the show has always really pushed representation and I can’t wait to see what they come up with next.”

Elsewhere in the hospital ensemble during “Drop It Like It’s Hot” – and in Grey’s fall final fashion — the episode ends with a big cliffhanger. After Sophia Bush’s Dr. Cass Beckman returned, Adams (Niko Terho) and Jo (Camilla Luddington)who is pregnant, is caught in an armed robbery at a convenience store. Jo starts bleeding somewhere in her body while the robbery takes place. Towards the end of the episode, Adams is able to fight the robber trying to take his gun from him, but the final scene sees the gun go off, seemingly hitting Adams in the stomach.

Grey’s Anatomy viewers will have to wait to find out what happens until the beloved series returns in the spring, on March 6, 2025.

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Grey’s Anatomy streaming season 21 on Hulu.