all that matters.

part one

A/N: This is a different style to how I'm used to writing so please leave any feedback you have. I know there's probably a lot of mistakes and bits that don't make any sense, and it seems waayyy too long, but please stick with it, and hopefully enjoy it! :)

EDIT: I also decided to change this from one big long one-shot to a 6-chapter arc thing, so it's more bearable to read :)

Their black SUV had been provided by her brother as a wedding gift a year ago. Now, they travelled everywhere in it. After they'd found out that she was pregnant with their daughter, they'd wanted to go on one last trip before she was born. She'd always liked Seattle and wanted to visit all the places, and so he blissfully agreed. She was in awe of the beauty of Seattle and wasn't at all worried about the 30 hour drive they'd have to embark on to Seattle and back to their home town of Chicago. They'd had an amazing time, and although she was somewhat restricted from doing some things due to the late stage in her pregnancy, she'd enjoyed it more than anything. She'd been with him, and that's all that mattered. They'd drove back from the Space Needle and to their hotel, where they loaded up that all so familiar SUV with all their belongings and set back out on that 30-hour drive back to Chicago.

She'd always loved the idea of being a mother, and knew from the moment that he met him, when they got together, when he proposed, when they got married, to now, he'd be an amazing father too. She loved her brother for his jocular moods, but when he'd found out she was pregnant, her opinion of him had changed drastically, however not too much to make her hate him, not ever. Her brother had already had two kids and had been constantly lecturing her on how to parent her daughter, which she abhorred and couldn't stand. She'd zone out and think about the first time her and her husband had met, where they worked, at Firehouse 51 in Chicago, when she transferred there as a paramedic. He was the Lieutenant of the Truck Company and she was the Paramedic in Charge. She'd think of all the challenges they'd encountered through the stages of their relationship, but ultimately was beatific at where they'd ended up now, married.

She stared out of the window as they drove down the freeway, watching them pass by trees and grass like it was nothing. She admired the sun and generally the overall warmth of the place; Chicago had always been cold, sure, it was her home, but it was freezing there, almost all the time. She placed a hand on her stomach as she leant her head against the window, smiling at her husband, who was concentrating on driving but occasionally looking over at her to make sure she was okay. She'd loved always how his top priority was always her and her wellbeing, no matter the situation. She loved him so much, as he did her. He energetically sung along to the music on the radio as she sniggered at his awful singing.

The journey was quiet, other than the singing, and he was becoming ever so slightly irritable about how much they had to stop for her to go to the toilet; she was pregnant, after all. He pulled out of a gas station as she fell asleep, only to be awoken by the wave of horns as a van swerved into them at such a speed that they saw nothing before it happened. They could do nothing. Nothing; then, resounding silence.

The crash seemed to take forever as the adrenaline coursed through her body at the same pace a rocket blasts off into space. She was convinced; she could see there was no hope; she could see she was going to die. She was going to die, her husband was going to die, her unborn daughter was going to die. Their ashes would be scattered and their gravestones placed and after a while they would all be forgotten. Her entire life flashed through her eyes as she travelled through the never-ending light. No one could help them now; it was too late. The van in the lane had swerved into them and knocked them off their course down into the embankment. She was trapped in a steel prison; they all were. She was convinced they were all going to die; she was a paramedic; she was sure they couldn't live through this. As the front of the car collided with the metal railing, she suddenly hated inertia.

At the last second, he jumped. His body hit the hood of the car and he screamed. Or rather, screamed as loud as he could which was not that loud at all. His bones and muscles and joints and organs felt like they were being crushed and being forced into a tiny box. His lungs contracted with such force that he was afraid that they would fold into themselves and he would die. He was convinced he wouldn't survive; he was a firefighter; he'd witnessed more car crashes than he could count. He knew this wasn't good; he knew his odds weren't good so he just lay there, waiting for death to come and pick him up and carry him away from this damned place. His torso and head was smashed up against the windshield whilst his arms and legs were flailing, searching desperately for somewhere to hold and stop the forward movement his body was enduring. If he had died, he'd always wanted to do it in his hometown surrounded by his family and friends, not in a foreign place, watching his wife, the love of his life, and their unborn daughter, crumble into ashes with him. The world must have kept flickering its almighty light switch because everything went from blinding light to bitter darkness within a matter of seconds. He knew this was a bad idea; he'd wanted to take his wife on one last trip before the arrival of their daughter; she'd always wanted to visit Seattle and so he agreed. Now, he wished he'd been more adamant with his decision to stay home and let her rest. The only sounds filling his ears were piercing screams and blank faces from pedestrians, rushing over to help the two of them. He could almost hear the dialling tone as a woman rushed out of her house to call 911, drowned out by the cracking of the glass and the shattering of his own bones. He was flying through the windshield from the impact that had happened seconds before, his air bag failing to deploy, his seat belt ripping from the impact, resting his bloody, bruised head on the black bonnet of his car. He'd forgotten about his head, about his previous injury. Now he was convinced that he was going to die. He just wished that she wasn't.

The car had crashed with such a force that she'd become disoriented before she even sustained the concussion that had her constantly drifting through a dream-like state, in and out of consciousness. She was fleetingly aware of the bloody taste in her mouth but she couldn't and didn't have the strength to figure it out. Why was she in pain? So much pain? She looked down at her belly and noticed a pool of water forming on the car seat. She was painfully aware of what that meant, and she knew that she needed to get out of here, now. She felt for her forehead, covered in blood. Just as she thought about debating forcing herself out of the car, she saw and heard the all too familiar blue sirens of the ambulance, flashing in the distance, as if they were the cause of her dipping in and out of consciousness. Her head was banging, like all of humanity had gathered in there, roaring in isolation, punching against her skull. She was drowning in a wave of melancholy determined to kill her and her daughter. She couldn't think about her, though. What about him? How was her husband? She frantically looked around for him but couldn't see him next to her. That's when she looked up, seeing his body lying motionless on the bonnet of the car. No. He couldn't die and leave her to live. And with his previous brain injury? He couldn't leave her. Not yet. He couldn't leave her and their daughter.