She was about to begin the vertical incision when her pager beeped impatiently. Pausing, the scalpel still next to the pale skin, she contemplated whether or not she should answer the page. The beeping continued; her heart pounded. It was a matter of life or death. Lately, it seemed, everything was a matter of life or death. She placed the scalpel back on the instrument tray and turned to look at her pager. The number was Derek's. It was followed by 911.

Why would he be sending me a 911 page?

"You paged?" she asked when Derek answered his cell phone.

"I can't find her!" he cried, frantic. "Please, tell me you know where she is."

"Who? Meredith?"

"Who else would I be looking for?"

"I don't know. I haven't seen her since she left for the scene," she was referring to the morning's ferry accident that had flooded all of Seattle's hospitals with surgical patients. "Didn't she go with you?"

"We got separated. I tried to page her several hours ago, but she hasn't answered."

"She probably came back to the hospital with a patient."

There are people in this hospital dying slow, painful deaths, and he's worried about his girlfriend.

"None of the attendings on scene gave her permission to leave to scrub in for surgery."

"I'm sure she's around somewhere."

"Page me if you see her," he begged before clicking the phone shut without saying goodbye.

She stared at her cell phone, wondering just how bad the ferry scene was and how Derek could have the audacity to look for his girlfriend. She rolled her eyes and started to pick up the scalpel again. Again, beeping interrupted her procedure. This time, it was her cell phone. More annoyed than before, she flipped the phone open without looking at the caller ID.

"Derek! I already…"

"Addie!" Richard's voice interrupted. "Can you come down to the pit?"

"Sure, Chief. What do you have?"

"Female. Approximately seven months pregnant. Severe facial fractures, multiple contusions. BP is holding steady. She's currently stable, but has lost a lot of blood."

"I'm on my way." She placed the scalpel in an autoclave as she shredded her surgical wear and headed toward the elevators.

GAGAGAGAGAGAGAGAGAGAGAGAGAGAGAGAGAGAGAGAGAGAGAGA

When she first fell into the bay, Meredith fought her way to the surface. She took a deep breath of air and shivered. The water in her shoes made her feet feel too heavy. Coughing up water, Meredith realized no one would know she was missing for a while. It would be nice to just slip away. Testing her courage, she let herself slip under once more. Meredith had been submerged in the cold, dirty water for only a minute when she made the final decision to give up. She stopped fighting her way back to the surface and kept her eyes closed tight. She sunk further into the bay. Suddenly, a pain in her chest made her eyes open wide.

I don't want to die! It hurts!

She tried to kick, but the more she moved, the harder it was to fight. Her head pounded; her chest ached. Her arms were too heavy to lift and floated limply along her sides. She gave a final kick before releasing her breath. Bubbles escaped from her nose and mouth, and everything went black.