Day One.
What the hell is that noise? Callie thought to herself, a low groaning sound reaching her ears. Oh, it dawned on her a moment later, it's me.
Calliope Torres lay in a pile of snapped twigs and broken bits of twisted metal, heaving out panting breaths and short moans of discomfort. Her eyes focused on the green leaves that hung overhead from branches, and the thin streams of sunlight that shone through the gaps between them. For a moment, just a moment, the scenery that she found herself surrounded by was almost serene.
There was no pain just yet. There was nothing.
That didn't last long at all however, a piercing scream soon ringing out through the woods, following another, sending birds flying from the trees.
It startled Callie so much so that she bolted upright to sit, a sharp pain shooting through her head as she did so. "Fuck," She hissed, bringing up a hand to press to her forehead, eyes instinctively squeezing shut. "Fuck," She repeated, the whole situation suddenly becoming too real for her.
She had been on a plane. The plane…crashed? But she was alive. Were her friends alive? Oh God, was her wife alive?
Forcing her eyes back open, she surveillanced the area, trying to locate where the scream was coming from.
Her eyes landed on a prone body not to far from her; the only defining feature she was able to see while in her current position was a head of matted blonde hair. No one else on the plane had hair like that.
"Arizona!" Callie cried out, voice hoarse and breaking through the last syllable of the other woman's name.
The screaming came to a gasping stop, quiet grunting heard shortly after as Arizona attempted to twist her body in order to see the woman to whom the voice belonged. She knew that voice anywhere, under any circumstances, but she needed to visually confirm that her ears weren't deceiving her.
"Call…iope," A strained voice answered, causing a puff of air to escape past Callie lips in relief. The hand that was still strewn across her face came into contact with something wet and Callie quickly pulled it away to see if it was blood, but it wasn't. She was crying. Quickly, she wiped the tears from existence.
"Arizona, don't move! I'm going to come to you!" From what she could see on herself, she wasn't injured too badly. There were several short gashes across her right bicep where sharp pieces of aluminum had sliced the flesh open right through the material of her shirt, causing blood to drip from the cuts and stain her blue scrub top a deep purple color. Callie had an obvious concussion as well and she would most likely be in need of stitches, but she didn't feel as though her life was at risk.
Arizona, on the other hand, had been letting out a series of screams, which couldn't indicate anything good. She'd never heard her scream like that before. Callie was scared to check on her, but she had to.
Then, there was the task of finding the others.
Slowly, the brunette rose to her feet, stumbling slightly and nearly toppling over, but catching herself at the last moment. She forced herself to walk forward, each step slightly painful, only stopping when she was less than a foot away from Arizona.
Being so close to her wife allowed her to see her main injury, and the sight of something so horrible on the woman she loved make her want to vomit. Callie was used to seeing broken bones - she saw them almost daily, as a result of specializing in ortho. But it was a completely different story when it was a broken bone of someone she loved.
"Oh, sweetie," Callie whispered, walking around her and kneeling by her side, eyes scanning over the blonde's injured thigh before gazing up to the scrapes along the side of her face. Her left side had definitely taken most of the impact.
Arizona had most likely ripped open her pants where her leg was broken in order to assess the damage before Callie had even woken up and the sight that they were met with because of it was horrifying. And that's when the screaming began.
Callie tried to swallow past the lump that formed in her throat to no avail. Reaching down, she took Arizona's right hand within her own.
'Don't freak out, don't freak out, don't freak out,' was a constant mantra in the brunette's mind.
"Callie," Arizona whined quietly, blue eyes wide and terrified as they gazed into brown, hand squeezing hers for dear life. "I… I can see my bone." Her voice was so small and quiet that it was a wonder that the previous screams could've even come from her fragile body. "Are you…okay?"
Skipping over Arizona's statement for the time being, she quickly nodded at the question, which caused her head to throb. "I'm okay, and you're going to be okay too. Let's get you sitting up so I can take a look at your leg, alright?" Callie's voice was tight as she desperately fought to keep her composure.
Arizona just gave a slight nod of her head in confirmation, choosing to not speak on the fact that this all was most certainly not okay.
With Callie's help, the blonde was soon brought up into a sitting position, back leaning against a piece of wreckage.
A human femur is the longest and strongest bone in the body. The orthopedic surgeon knew that because femurs were so strong, it usually took a lot of force to break one. And knowing that fact, made her heart ache for Arizona. She must've been tossed around like a ragdoll.
Tentatively, Callie reached out to peel back a strip of fabric partially covering the wound, the slight action earning her a hiss of pain from between Arizona's clenched teeth. "I'm sorry," Callie whispered even though she didn't halt her movements, needing to fully check just how bad her leg was.
"It's fine," Arizona answered mainly because she knew adrenaline was still coursing through her veins and she was more than likely in shock, which meant she wasn't feeling the full extent of her injuries just yet. And even though Callie noted that there weren't any immediate signs of infection, she knew the wound still had to be cleaned out. They needed a first aid kit.
"Still," The brunette countered, voice low as she focused on the task at hand which included making sure that Arizona's broken leg wouldn't become infested with the bugs that crawled across the forest floor.
"You aren't okay," Arizona then suddenly gasped, the fingertips of her left hand delicately brushing across a gash that marred Callie's chest, causing the brunette to sharply inhale, not having anticipated the touch to sting. "You're all cut up," She sadly continued, as if she just fully regained her sight and realized that her wife hadn't come out of the crash completely unscathed.
"Just a few scratches," Callie readily brushed off, even though she somehow hadn't noticed that the laceration across her own chest. "I need to take care of you first, then our friends. I'm okay, I promise."
A sudden look of realization passed over bloodied features, Arizona's jaw hanging slightly agape. "Our friends," She quietly repeated, blinking several times. "Oh God. Are they alive? Have you seen any of them?"
Normally, if Callie got a cut that looked as though it may need even a stitch or two, the wives would get into a spat over whether or not the brunette should actually allow a needle to touch the open wound. Callie would argue that a few scars were badass and sexy, while Arizona would point out the higher risk for infection if it went unstitched. And Callie would normally give in. They didn't usually bring up the possibility of the colleagues they came to know as their family, being dead.
"I haven't seen them," Callie answered, clearing her throat shortly afterwards. She couldn't cry again, she couldn't let Arizona see her cry. That would just worsen things. "But I'm going to find them. I... I'm sure they're okay."
No, Callie didn't know if any of the rest of them had survived. But if nothing else, she had to at least keep some form of hope.
"Okay," Arizona briefly closed her eyes as she sighed out the barely audible single word, giving a short nod as her eyes fluttered back open, locking with Callie. "Okay."
A tight smile was all Arizona received from Callie in response.
Five minutes later, Callie was standing up and letting go of her hand, a kiss being pressed to Arizona's forehead in the process. "I love you," She stated, feeling as if it'd been far too long since the last time she let her wife be aware of that fact. "I'll be back soon. Don't go anywhere."
"I love you too," Arizona immediately answered, needing to hear those words. "And where exactly could I possibly go?" Her tone was light even though her voice was strained, split lips offering the slightest hint of a smile. But the smile didn't reach her eyes nor did it cause her dimples to be on display.
Callie gave her forehead another kiss in response, bruised fingers combing tangled locks of blonde hair. "I'll be back," She quietly said again before slowly backing away from Arizona.
Arizona silently watched as Callie hurried off to check for their friends before blue eyes traveled back down to gaze at her broken thighbone. A shaky sigh expelled past her lips. Normally, a broken leg wouldn't be that big of a deal. But when you're in the middle of the woods, surrounded by plane debris with no hospital in sight, it suddenly becomes a very big deal.
She could hear Callie's voice calling out the names of the other that had been onboard.
"Mark?! Cristina?! Meredith?! Derek?! Lexie?!"
Then Arizona barely heard the echoes of, "Oh thank God," and assumed she had been successful in finding someone.
Distant chatter filled the air, and Arizona released several calming breaths.
They'd get through this.
"I found Cristina and Meredith draining Mark's chest with tube from one of those spray bottles things. There was a buildup of fluid, and…" Callie trailed off, palms harshly rubbing over her closed eyes as she tried to think, a first aid kit settled between the two women.
Callie was now sitting in front of Arizona, who had reached out and rested a hand against her thigh. "Oh my God," The blonde's free hand rose to cover her mouth. "Is he going to be okay? Where's Lexie? And Derek?"
Callie forced her eyes back open as tears reluctantly filled them. "I don't know if he'll be okay," She answered in an honest whisper, voice trembling as she stumbled over the words, the thought of losing Mark too causing all the air to expel from her lungs. "Derek's hand was crushed but Meredith stitched it and cleaned it, but Lexie… Lexie didn't…"
"Oh," Arizona rasped out, blinking rapidly as tears tracing thin lines down her cheeks. "Oh, no."
Callie chose to not speak further on the subject for the time being, knowing that if she did, she'd more likely than not completely breakdown. And she couldn't do that. Instead, she began the meticulous task of cleaning Arizona's leg, trying to use the disinfectant spray sparingly since she had no idea how long they'd be out there. The though absolutely terrified her, but what was she to do?
Callie simply let Arizona cry as she tended to her leg, eyes focused on her own methodical movements.
The blonde didn't protest when Callie stated she was going to put a makeshift splint on her leg and instead she just stared off into space, not seeming to look at anything in particular.
There was nothing to say - they had lost one of their own.
Callie didn't even realize she'd begun to cry.
Were they going to get through this?
A/N: First time writing a Grey's fic, so you should let me know if I'm on the right track! Thank you!