Brave Face
Notes - I whipped this up in about two hours. It hasn't been extensively beta-ed - any errors are my own darned fault :) I've based this story on clips we've seen from previews for Flight. I wanted realism (barring the deaths of everybody in the plane; I'll pass on that kind of realism). I wanted some cuddling. I wanted some humor, even in the face of disaster. And I really wanted Meredith to find Derek.
"Derek!" Meredith yelled into the woods as she gripped her walking stick.
Silence answered.
He wasn't anywhere.
How could he not be anywhere?
He had to be somewhere.
Unless he was just a body.
Then he would be gone.
She stopped to rest against a tree, panting. Sick. She felt woozy. She was pretty sure she had a concussion. Something had happened to her calf. Something painful that wept blood into her light blue scrubs.
She'd fallen. Out of a freaking plane.
She and Derek had fallen out of a freaking plane that had fallen out of the freaking sky.
"Derek," she shrieked.
She fought creeping numbness in her leg, and she stumbled forward, held up, barely, by the makeshift walking stick. Her hands shook and slipped, too wet with sweat and weak with shock for a good grip. Her shoes dragged through mud and leaves. She blinked.
She could hear her friends behind her. Yelling. Mark and Cristina. Rushing around. Trying to help Dr. Robbins and Lexie and the pilot. They had things under control.
Meredith had gone to look for Derek by herself.
Maybe, not the wisest thing to do.
But she was concussed, and Derek was missing, and she'd fallen out of a freaking plane. Lexie had been stable, and so Meredith had picked up a stick and started walking. Limping. To find him.
Her husband.
The plane had been pointing south, so she'd walked north.
"Derek!"
The word bounced off the trees and the sky and the earth. For a long moment, she heard only birds. Insects. Nothing civilized. A butterfly fluttered past. If she'd been less frantic, she might have thought it pretty. Relaxing. The forest was thick with trees. Crepuscular rays cut through the canopy in places, slashing down to the mossy forest floor like knives. They gave the place an ethereal feel.
The hairs on her neck stood on end as a distant voice carried on the wind. Help, she thought it said. And the voice had been Derek's timbre.
"Derek!"
Help. The word was more solid that time. More solid, and full of fear and pain. She imagined him broken. Trapped like Lexie. Her breaths sped up. She blinked. She headed toward the clot of trees she thought the call had emanated from. Headed northwest. Limped northwest.
"Derek, where are you?" she called. Her voice cracked. She cleared her throat.
Nothing, that time. She could have imagined his plea. She was desperate enough to imagine it.
"Derek!"
Nothing called back, and her shuffling steps sped up to frantic shambling despite pain.
"Derek, call out again!" she said. "I can't find you!"
She clawed through bracken and ferns and thorns and god knew what. Tripped over logs and rocks. Slipped on sucking mud. The sun was hot against her face. Everything hurt. She was concussed. She had to stop to throw up twice, but she kept going. Kept moving.
She'd fallen. Out of a freaking plane.
"Derek!"
"Help," he said. Unmistakably him, that time. Closer than she expected. He sounded... tired. Faint. Scared. She jerked to a stop. Glance around. Listened.
"Say something one more time," she yelled.
But he didn't speak. She wheeled about. Looked wildly for him.
She saw the airplane seat bench, first. Caught in the branches of a thick tree, about ten feet up. The seat bench was tipped back slightly, so anybody sitting it in would be looking up through the branches at the sky, not down at the ground at her. A bloody seatbelt dangled and swung in the cool breeze. Below the seat, on the ground, lay a wet puddle of... something. Not blood, she realized as she got closer. Vomit. A shiny scalpel lay next to the puddle. His pocket scalpel. The one he always carried. And Derek's feet were dangling over the side of the bench.
Derek was sitting in the freaking tree.
"Derek," she called, and she ran stumbled tripped to him, eyes watering.
She couldn't see anything but his legs. He couldn't be too broken. He'd called for help.
"Help," he said, the word soft and sick enough that she barely heard it as she limped under the tree, and she wondered if he actually had said something those times she hadn't heard him yell, just... not loud enough. He didn't move. That was a bad sign.
"Where are you hurt?" she said.
He'd clearly cut himself loose from his seatbelt with that scalpel. The fact that he hadn't come down out of the tree scared her. There were branches all the way to the ground. Anyone could climb it. She could climb it. Climb up after him. Maybe. Maybe, if she weren't concussed and limping. Surely, he could climb down?
A long silence stretched.
Her heart crept into her throat.
"Derek?"
"Meredith?" he said, faintly.
"Yeah," she said, swallowing. "I'm here. How bad are you hurt?"
"You're not dead," he said, his voice shaky.
"I'm here," she repeated. "I'm here, and you're here."
"The plane crashed."
"I know," she said, growing more concerned by the moment. "How bad are you hurt?"
"The plane... crashed."
She shook her head. This was getting nowhere, and her stomach was churning with butterflies. Bad, evil, mutant butterflies that told her something was really freaking wrong with him. She threw her stick to the side into the bracken and gripped the first branch. Her arms were fine. She could do this.
She hoisted herself up one branch. Two. Bark slipped underneath her shoes. Everything hurt, and she thought she might throw up again, but something was wrong with Derek. She stuffed the bile down and kept climbing. The seat came into view. Derek's face. His body.
From the odd the way he cradled his left arm, something had happened with his shoulder or his arm or his wrist. His face was covered with blood, and he had a lap full of vomit. He'd cracked his head on something in the fall. His whole body shook. He stared blankly ahead of him through lowered eyelashes, and his breathing was... wheezy. Bruised or broken ribs? Three injuries, then. At least.
"Hey," she said softly as she reached eyelevel with him.
For a long moment, he didn't respond.
"Derek," she said more loudly. "Hey."
That got his attention. His gaze shifted. Toward her. "You're not dead," he said.
"No."
He swallowed. His eyes were glassy and unfocused. "I couldn't get down to find you."
She glanced at the seat. She wondered how stable it was. If it was safe for her to crawl into it. She needed to crawl into it to get to him.
"You were sitting next to me," he said. Babbled. "And then you weren't."
"I'm here," she said. "I'm here, Derek. It's okay. I'm okay. Mark and Cristina are back helping Lexie and Dr. Robbins and our pilot, and I'm here, helping you. Everybody is okay so far." She swallowed. "Well, everybody is alive," she amended.
"I hope you're real," he said, his voice a whisper. He closed his eyes, and he didn't move.
She bit her lip. "I'm real," she said.
She shimmied out onto the branch. This was stupid. She was concussed, and her leg hurt, and this was a stupid way to die, falling out of a tree after surviving a plane crash, but... she put her knee onto the seat. The bench didn't budge. The tree didn't sway. The branches here were thick.
She put her full weight onto the bench, squeezing her eyes shut.
Nothing happened.
She scooted close to him. The reek of stale vomit made her nose crinkle. When she leaned across his body, he didn't move. When touched his shoulder, he flinched and he moaned, deep and low, and the sound made her insides tighten with stress. She could feel bone poking into the shoulder of his coat. A clear shoulder dislocation.
It'd been dark out when they'd crashed. It'd been hours. He'd been sitting for hours with his shoulder out of its socket. He had to be in pain, and he was probably so swollen at this point that a field reduction would be very difficult, particularly in a freaking tree. He could need surgery.
They were both a freaking mess.
They'd both fallen out of a plane.
"I can't treat this in a tree," she snapped in frustration, staring at his arm. "I have no leverage up here." She swallowed. Blinked. "And my head is kind of spinny at the moment."
"You're hurt," he said.
"So are you!" she said. "I'm going to tell you three words. I want you to see if you can remember them. Okay?"
He didn't reply. She didn't know what to do. She couldn't get him out of the tree by herself. He was too big, and she was too small, and they were both concussed lummoxes with one out of four bad limbs. It was too high to jump without risking broken legs in addition to everything else.
A wave of hopelessness crushed her against the rocks, but she refused to give up.
She refused.
"Plane, vomit, contusion," she said stubbornly at him. "Remember those. Okay?"
He swallowed. Nodded just a little. Didn't even make a joke about her interesting choice of words.
She couldn't get him out of the tree. She didn't want to leave him. She curled up under his good arm, instead. Wrapped her arm over his stomach and snuggled close like she did when they slept in their bed. She was tired. She felt sick. She hurt. They'd fallen out of a plane. At least, if she was going to die from lack of medical treatment and exposure, she could do it in his arms, now. That was nice.
"Derek and Meredith," he mused softly, the words slightly slurred, breaths wheezing. "Sitting in a tree."
She looked up at him. Snorted. The world was spinning, but she didn't need the world to be still in order to kiss him. She pressed her lips softly against his bloody cheek.
"K-I-S-S-I-N-G," he murmured.
She scrunched his dirty scrubs between her fingers and rubbed his thigh. Sighed. "We already have the baby in the baby carriage."
He grunted. Almost a laugh. He didn't move. "I hope she'll be okay."
"She'll be okay," Meredith said, a lump forming in her throat. She thought maybe this was the time to offer some other sort of reassurance. That they'd see Zola again. She wasn't so sure. They'd fallen out of plane. They needed help, and there wasn't any. Derek should be in a hospital getting a head CT, an x-ray for his ribs, and maybe shoulder surgery. Meredith needed stitches for her stupid leg and a cold compress for the egg on the back of her head. They needed all that, and they didn't even have water.
"What were the words I just told you?" she said.
He didn't answer. He was shivery and displaying signs of altered consciousness, but even then, his good arm tightened over her body. He hugged her close, and she hugged him in return.
She listened to the birds chirping. His body was warm, and her eyelids drooped. She thought she should check his head wound, or see what his torso looked like under his coat. But she was tired. She hurt. She was sick. She'd fallen out of a plane. And somehow, she'd found his embrace.
"I love you," he said unexpectedly, the words a croak.
"I love you, too," she said.
Five minutes, she told herself when she closed her eyes. Just five. She felt safe in his arms.
She had no idea how long it'd been when she snapped awake, but she suspected a lot more than five minutes. She felt much better. She had a headache, but things weren't spinning anymore, and she didn't feel seconds away from upchucking. Her leg throbbed. She looked down at the ground, and disorientation swelled in her head. Not the dizzy kind from a concussion. The holy-crap-I-just-woke-up-in-a-tree kind. The sun was in a different place, shining into her eyes through an empty space in the branches overhead, where before, it'd been shady. Derek rested beside her, wheezing, eyes closed. In the sunlight, he looked wretched. His hair was matted, and his skin was pale. She licked her dry lips and shook him, careful to avoid his bad shoulder.
"Derek," she said. "Wake up."
When he didn't rouse immediately, fear clenched her gut, and she shook him harder.
"Wake up!" she yelled in his ear.
"Mmm."
"Derek, you need to be awake," she said.
His eyes slid open halfway. He looked at her, blue eyes bright in the sunshine. She would have melted if he didn't look so ghastly. "You're not dead," he slurred. The hope in his eyes made her eyes burn.
"I'm not dead," she confirmed. She tried to run her fingers through his hair, but she got stuck after an inch. She settled on cupping his face. "I'm not dead, Derek. Can you remember these three words for me? Plane, vomit, contusion."
He nodded just a little.
She held her right index finger in front of his face. "Follow my finger with your eyes," she said. She moved her finger across his field of view and up and down. He could barely chase the movements, let alone catch them.
"Are you dizzy?" she said.
"Yes," he croaked.
She bit her lip at the vomit all over him. All over the ground. "Still nauseous?"
He nodded.
"How badly do you hurt?"
"N... nine," he said faintly.
"What three words did I say?" she said.
He stared at her for a long time without answering. "Plane..." he said.
"Good," she said, nodding. "Good, that's one. Can you remember the other two?"
No response. He didn't even shake his head. She clenched her teeth, unwilling to let the stress overtake her. Remembering one word of three was better than what he'd done before. An improvement. And she felt better, now, too. She could get them out of this.
She unzipped his coat. He didn't resist. She slid her hand underneath his scrubs and felt for broken ribs. There was nothing obvious, though her touch made him wheeze harder. Like he was in more pain from the pressure of her hand against his warm skin. At least his skin was warm. That was a good sign. He was dizzy and disoriented, hurt badly enough to call it a nine even when he wasn't moving, had something wrong with his breathing, and he had a grotesquely dislocated shoulder that she could feel even through his thick coat. But at least he was warm.
She wasn't sure he could climb or even get out of the airplane seat, but... "We need to get out of this tree and get back to the others. It's only ten feet, and there are plenty of branches. Can you try to climb down? I'll help."
She had no idea how the hell she would help with her leg throbbing, but they needed to get back to the plane. She didn't think anybody could find them out here, and Derek needed help. They both needed help.
"Derek, please?" she said.
A smile trembled at his lips. "You know I can't say no to that," he quipped, his voice weak.
She couldn't help but smile back at him. Stroked his cheek. "I know."
She kissed him.
"I like the kissing," he said, his eyelids hanging low like he just wanted to sleep. "More kissing, I say."
She giggled despite stress. Kissed him again. And then she shimmied back off the seat onto the first branch. She rested her good leg on the branch and held her weight off her bad leg. She held out her arms for him, trying to encourage him forward.
"You can do it," she said. "It's not too far."
He moved like a drunk sloth. His bad arm hung uselessly at his side. The sound of his body sliding across the seat was a maddening, quiet rustle that took forever. Branches creaked. She backed against the tree trunk to give him room, and he slid out onto the branch with her, panting, but he didn't try to climb.
"I can't see very well," he confessed.
"It's okay," she said. She slipped down one branch, putting her head at waist level with him. "There's a branch about two feet below you, slightly counterclockwise from the branch you're on, now."
He stepped down with one leg. She reached. Guided his foot onto the branch. He brought his other foot down, slithering against the bark. He clutched the branch he'd just been standing on with his good hand. He trembled. Panted.
Their progress was awkward. Slow. He had to rest every branch. So did she. But they made it to the bottom. Made it together with her shouting encouragements and telling him how to find the next branch and guiding his feet. They were a good team.
Derek threw up again at the base of the tree. From pain or nausea, she had no idea. She tried to help him out of his coat so she could get a better look at his shoulder, but that alone made him yell like he was dying, and she cringed away, unable to be his doctor when she was his wife. "Sorry, sorry," she said quickly.
"It's okay," he said, shaking like a leaf. His eyes were glassy.
He definitely had an anterior dislocation, but that was all she could tell without a closer examination. There was no way she'd be able to fix it by herself, not when the bone been out of the socket so long, not when hearing him in pain made her shake. She needed more muscle. She needed scissors to get his coat off. She needed Mark is what she needed.
"We have to get back to the others," she said.
He nodded. Stumbled to his feet, only to collapse against the tree trunk onto his good arm as he blanched. "Oh," he said, almost swooning. And then he looked at her. Blinked. She imagined his head spinning. "You're hurt," he said. Croaked.
She glanced down. Her pant leg was red and sticky.
"I think you win if we're having a wound competition," she said with a watery smile.
He chuckled. Wheezed. "Our plane crashed," he said.
"Yeah," she said.
He laughed. Really laughed. The humor leaking out of his mouth was incongruous with the pain pinching his eyes and the unfocused glaze in his gaze, but it was a delightful sound, nonetheless. And infectious.
She laughed, too. "It's pretty stupid," she said.
"It's fucking ludicrous," he replied, the words slightly slurred. "You drowned, and I got shot, and our fucking plane crashed."
She hobbled to him. He stepped away from the tree. When they met, he wrapped his good arm over her shoulder. She sank against his trembling body. Lifted weight off her throbbing calf. Despite his shivers, he was warm and solid and alive and him. In obvious pain. Nauseous. But alive and him.
"We should go to Vegas, soon," he muttered.
"Why?" she said.
"I figure it's either win big at craps or get hit by lightning, next."
She laughed again. Wiped happy-sad tears from her eyes. "Yeah. Probably. I like to play craps."
"Do you?" he said. "I didn't know that."
She looked up at him. Smiled. Brushed his face with her palm. "Yeah, I do. But I have one request."
"What?" he said.
"Let's drive, if we go."
He laughed. Pressed his lips against her forehead. Squeezed her tightly with his good arm. He took a short, wheezy breath. "Which way?" he said.
Meredith pointed. Shuffled forward one step.
"No," he said. "Lean on me. You're hurt."
"Seriously?" she said.
"My legs are fine," he said. "Just... tell me if I'm going to trip on a log or something."
"Deal," she said, smiling.
They hobbled back together, three good legs, three good arms, two strong hearts, and they both gave Zola a kiss less than twenty-four hours later.