A new girl, called Polina, wants to become Bykov's intern. Unfortunately for her, Bykov doesn't want yet another moron whom he must teach, so he tasks his existing interns to explain why she should leave — which wouldn't be easy, since she's already dead set to stay.
Kisegach in concerned with hiding her pregnancy from ministry's inspector, out of fear that ministry would force her into maternity leave if they find out, and put one of their own on her place (and it wouldn't be easy to kick them out afterwards). Meanwhile, Polina asks Rita what she may do to convince Bykov, and she suggests to try Kisegach: a woman who convinced Bykov to live with her can achieve anything; in any case, it's unlikely that Bykov would refuse his pregnant woman. But right in the middle of their discussion, an inspector finally arrives, and Polina accidentally reveals Kisegach's pregnancy to him.
Semyon once again has a conflict with Olga, this time because he didn't pay their electricity bill (despite already having the money and bank being easily available). Lobanov tries to defend himself by stating that he simply forgot... and in turn gets accused on simply wasting those money. And indeed, he spent them on repaying his debts to the other people. He tries to lie about it, only to be ordered, in no uncertain terms, to pay until the evening. Unfortunately, Semyon has no money (he blatantly lied to Olga), but everyone whom he asks, refuses to give him money again (and not just because he asked to not loan him); not even Gleb. Polina promises to pay the bill for him, only to realise that she has not enough money (his bill is way too high), and not enough time to find more.
Bykov asks his interns who of them considers himself being a moron (promising to reward whomever admits this by making his life "easier"). Only Semyon agrees, and gets rewarded... by receiving only one patient. Gleb and Phil, who remained silent, receives three patients... and now must somehow decide who would take the third one. Gleb and Phil still argues about their patient when Polina arrives and suggests them to simply "divide" him: each one would examine exactly one half, doing half the work. Gleb and Phil actually puts Polina's plan to use (even if it looks awkward), but quickly comes to a problem: the patient's problem is... exactly in the middle. After failing to agree on another method of dividing him, they receives another advice from Polina — just "divide" his organs. But this results in the patient (who overhears the discussion) mistaking them for organ thieves, and complaining to Bykov, who punishes them for asking Polina (not even intern) for advice on a problem they can't solve by themselves.
Polina still thinks that everything goes fine, but Rita thinks that this may be not enough (even Kisegach sometimes fails to convince Bykov, and he doesn't give a crap about his interns' opinions), and suggests to ask Kupitman as well. They actually comes along at first, but then Polina makes a mistake of calling him old. And later Polina manages to alienate even Rita, due to acting too familiar.
In the end of the day, Polina confronts Bykov and states that everyone would speak in her favour, so he must hire her. He allows her to invite the others so they may vouch for her... and literally everyone tries to convince Bykov not to hire her. To everyone's surprise, this is exactly what convinces Bykov to give Polina a chance after all: he got genuinely impressed... by her ability to enrage people. So, Polina is officially Bykov's new intern... for now.
This episode provides examples of:
- The Alcoholic: Polina exploits Kupitman's love for cognac in order to get along with him. This actually works... right until she makes a mistake of calling him old.
- Didn't Think This Through: Lobanov's plan (to pay all his debts so he would be free from them at last) has one little flaw: he needs those money he just spent to pay his bills.
- Digging Yourself Deeper: Polina assumes that Kupitman is sixty years old (him looking much older than he really is is a major issue for him, and one of the few really working ways to make him angry at you), increasing his real age by around twenty years. Realising that he is not amused, she tries to "fix" her mistake, by asking whether he is fifty eight instead... or maybe fifty seven?.. Before she could say anything else, Kupitman tells her to leave. He's so angry, he even refuses to take her cognac.
- Establishing Character Moment: The whole Polina's plot is a series of scenes which sets up just how non-existent Polina's social skills are; she reveals Kisegach's pregnancy to the wrong people, potentially putting her job at risk); calls Kupitman old; suggests to Phil and Gleb a plan which only makes their problem worse and causes them more problems in the end for accepting her help in the first place; fails to help Lobanov due to inability to think ahead, with him possibly being in the better condition had he never bothered to ask Polina at all; and finally, irritates Rita by her familiarity, despite them not only not being friends yet, but also having age gap of eight years and knowing each other for less than a day. This combination, however, is what convinces Bykov to let her stay: he was impressed by her ability to enrage people.
- The Friend Nobody Likes: Polina manages to become an outcast before even starting working here, due to everyone she interacted with during her first day now wanting her out. However, this is exactly why Bykov chose to let her in after all.
- Hoist by His Own Petard: When Semyon paid Gleb his debts, he specifically asked him to never loan again, even stating Long List of excuses he may try to use (amongst them, weddings, funerals, anniversaries and even abstract "Olga would kill me!", or attempts to scare Gleb into compliance). Unfortunately, Lobanov now needs those money back. He asked other people for the same things, too.
- Hope Spot: When Bykov asks everyone what they think about Polina, Lobanov is the only one to speak in her favour. Then Olga calls, yelling at him for failing to pay his bills (she also decided to leave to her mother), and he realises that Polina broke her promise to him, and joins everyone else in hating her.
- My Secret Pregnancy: While, thanks to Bykov, her pregnancy is no longer a secret for anyone in the hospital, Kisegach still must hide it from the people from ministry, so they wouldn't use it as excuse to force her into maternity leave (which quite possibly may become permanent, to allow them to set their own pawn as a chief doctor). But her obsession with hiding her growing belly (which is not even that big yet) borders on paranoia, which Bykov helpfully points out.
- Open Mouth, Insert Foot: Some of the conflicts Polina has with other people are directly caused by her not thinking before saying:
- Polina reveals Kisegach's pregnancy to the inspector, despite it being exactly what Kisegach tried to hide (for a good reason).
- Polina calls Kupitman old (suggesting that he may be about sixty, while he is less than fifty years old). Her attempts to apology only makes the situation worse.
- Rita, initially allied to Polina, gets annoyed by Polina acting too familiar with her, despite them knowing each other for less than a day, and having almost ten years of age gap.
- Out-of-Context Eavesdropping: Phil's and Gleb's patient overhears them discussing who would "take" which organ. Predictably, he interprets it as them being organ thieves. In reality, they discussed who wold treat which organ, since they "divided" them so each one would do only half a work (still crazy, but at least non-malicious).
- Perpetual Poverty: Lobanov finally pays all his debts to people around him (as Gleb points out, for likely the first time in his life), only to find out that he longer has money to pay his bills. When he tries to convince Olga that he still has enough to pay for electricity (he simply "forgot"), she doesn't believe him and gives him exactly one day to deal with problem. And he can't just take back money he gave to Gleb, too, because he asked him to never loan again, so Semyon wouldn't be tempted to continue his circle of perpetual debts. He later asks Polina for help, but she fails to pay, because she has only 500 roubles, and Semyon owes 5K; she's actually surprised by sheer amount of money Semyon owes, and asks whether he accumulated this sum over three years (knowing Semyon, this may very well be true).
- Take a Third Option: How Polina "helps" Gleb and Semyon with their patient.
- Polina's first plan is to "divide" the patient; they would examine only one half of the patient, doing exactly one half of the work. This actually works for a time (even if looks silly), but then it turns out that patient's problem is exactly in the middle, and both of them are more concerned with dumping work on another one than actually helping the patient.
- After first plan fails, Phil suggests to use another method: they would "divide" the patient not on left and right sides, but rather on top and bottom; when Gleb immediately agrees and decides to take the top, Phil realises what this means and tries the other idea, which immediately gets rejected by Gleb due to being biased in Phil's favour. Then Polina arrives again and suggests that each one would take one specific organ; if "your" organ hurts, you would be the one to deal with it. It backfires even worse than the first plan when patient overhears them "dividing" organs, and leads to Phil and Gleb being punished, for stupidity and asking an outsider for medicine-related advices.
- Thrill Seeker: Lobanov accuses Polina of being crazy adrenaline seeker due to her wanting to work under Bykov.Lobanov: Come on, guys, she is an adrenaline junkie! Like those they show on TV! They are jumping under cars, from windows, this one wants to become Bykov's intern!
- Zonk: Bykov promises that he would do the life of whoever admits he's a moron "slightly easier". Gleb and Phil immediately assumes it to be some sort of a trap and remains silent, and only Lobanov falls for it... and gets actually rewarded: he would receive only one patient. Gleb and Phil, due to being "smarter" than Lobanov, would receive three patients... and must somehow divide them. Gleb tries to dump a patient on Phil, stating that as the "smarter one", he must do more work; Phil counters it by stating that Gleb, being the "dumber one", must work more in order to become smart, too. They argues like this until Polina arrives and comes up with a plan how to "divide" the patient.
