Author's Note: Okay, guys… sorry I never really did an intro for my first chapter but this is my first published story on Fanfiction dot Net so I'm still getting used to things! I hope you enjoyed Chapter One of "Meant to Be"! If you have not gathered as much already, this is going to be an AU story where things do not end quite so tragically for the six surgeons on the flight from Seattle to Boise in 8x24. I obviously don't want to reveal too much but as of right now, the plan is that this story is going to go through the end of season 9, although of course the events that take place will be a little different. Thank you all SO much for all of the amazing reviews/favorites that I have gotten so far. I have been writing for almost my whole life but I have never "published" anything before so it's so amazing to see people actually reading and enjoying my work.
Oh and one more thing. Just in case you are confused by any of the dates in this story, in my Grey's Anatomy universe, everything took place one year after it did on the show. This just helped me fit a lot of timelines better together. So just to be clear, Meredith graduated medical school and started her internship in 2008. Lexie did the same in 2009. George died and MerDer got married in 2010 and the shooting happened in 2011. The plane crash is taking place in 2013.
All good? Okay I know this was way too long. Enjoy and please continue to leave reviews, it seriously means so much to me! Xoxo, merderpedia
There was smoke and there was screaming. Those were the first two things that managed to register in Meredith's aching mind. She could not figure out how to open her eyes yet but she could smell the smoke and she could hear multiple people yelling. And somehow, Meredith knew that things had turned from wrong to catastrophic.
Before she could consider the specifics though, Meredith passed out again and when she next awoke, it was because she heard a frantic voice: "Mer?! Meredith! Meredith, get up! You have to get up now!"
It was Cristina.
Slowly, Meredith opened her eyes. The world was blurry; there was something wrong with her sight but Meredith could tell that she was lying on the ground in the middle of a… forest? She was surrounded by trees, looking up at the sky with no memory of what had happened but she knew that she was not supposed to be here.
"Meredith, get up! Oh, God," Cristina begged so Meredith tried to sit up but she could not move… she was so dizzy and her head felt like it weighed a thousand pounds.
Instead, she looked around with the small amount of vision her eyes were providing. Nearby, Cristina was pacing nervously, all the while clutching her left arm with her right. Something was clearly wrong with it.
In the opposite direction, Mark was kneeling on the ground, tending to Arizona who was screaming hysterically. There was blood on both of their faces; there was blood on Cristina and Meredith could feel something wet trickling down the side of her head.
Meredith opened her mouth to ask if Cristina was alright but then she decided that that was a stupid question and just muttered, "H-How long was I out?"
"I don't… I don't know. I lost my shoe," Cristina said and she kept running around, as if the shoe was going to be hiding under a random leaf… because they were in the middle of the forest…
"Where's… where's Derek and Lexie?" Meredith asked.
"I… I don't know. I lost a shoe…"
"What happened? I'm… I'm bleeding," Meredith pressed; it was strange because there was blood everywhere and they were in the middle of the forest yet she still had no idea why they were here. Her mind was working in slow-motion…
Cristina was a mess, constantly moving but she stopped short, just long enough to stare at Meredith. "The plane crashed, that's what happened! We were in a plane and it crashed. Plane crash!"
The plane crashed. They were on their way to Boise, Idaho to operate on conjoined twins and the plane had crashed. Meredith had been kidding herself about how all those things could go wrong, how the plane could crash… and the plane had crashed.
Now, it was time to ask those important questions. Meredith could feel herself hyperventilating with fear. "Is… is everyone okay? Are you… okay?"
"I mean, if you count a fractured collarbone and a dislocated shoulder as okay then… yeah! Yeah, I'm freaking amazing!" Cristina cried and a certain amount of reality sunk in.
They were in a plane crash. People were injured. Perhaps people were dead. What if Derek was dead? Meredith felt tears well up in her eyes. "Where is D-Derek?! Cristina, where… is… Derek?!"
"He was sucked out the side when we hit the trees and then the back of the plane came off… it came… it came off," Cristina rambled.
Meredith remembered the way that her sister had been screaming. "Lexie was in the back of the plane!"
"I looked to the back and all I could see was freaking sky!" Cristina said.
"Where is she?!"
"I don't know! I only have one shoe!"
Cristina was clearly in shock because otherwise, she would be able to focus on something other than her damn shoe. Meredith ignored her and instead, reached up to wipe the side of her face which was becoming increasingly wet and sticky. Her hand came away splashed thick with bright, red blood and she had no idea where it was coming from…
Meredith did not think she could get up. It had nothing to do with the blood; Meredith was a surgeon and she could handle blood but she was still so dizzy and felt like if she attempted to stand, she would pass-out… and if she had a concussion or a head injury of any type, the worst thing to do would be to lose consciousness again.
You have to get up, Meredith told herself. She had to get up for Derek and Lexie so with all her strength, she attempted to haul herself into a sitting position but as soon as she did, the world went blurry and Meredith collapsed backwards, whispering, "Ow, ow…"
These words distracted Cristina from her missing shoe, for just a moment. "What's wrong? Are you… where does it hurt?"
"Everywhere," Meredith groaned and closed her eyes because she was so nauseous. "M-My… my head and… oh, God; I feel sick…"
Cristina knelt down next to Meredith and examined her, gently. "Yeah, your head is bleeding bad. Oh my God… oh my God, Mer…"
Meredith could not bring herself to answer. If she opened her mouth, she was going to be sick and the trees were spinning in uneven waves. They were in a plane crash. They were really in a plane crash… Meredith could feel her pulse racing from the shock and adrenaline.
"Meredith, I need you to keep talking to me," Cristina begged and then her voice was screaming. "We need help! Mark… Mark, p-please come help!"
There were fading footsteps from nearby; Meredith had a feeling that she slipped in and out of consciousness as Mark slowly made his way over. "What's going on? Is Grey alive?"
"She's alive but she's hurt bad and keeps passing out," Cristina said. "We've gotta wrap her head with something or she's gonna bleed out."
"Okay, um… okay, hold on," Mark said and he tore into some nearby wreckage and came back with some kind of blue fabric which he ripped in half. "This is all I can find."
"That's fine; that's fine… here, I'll hold her," Cristina said and Meredith felt her own head being lifted slightly off the ground. A second later, a set of frantic hands which likely belonged to Mark were wrapping the dressing around her skull.
"Is that okay?"
"It'll have to be," Cristina said. "Mer… Mer, can you hear me?"
Meredith swallowed hard before answering. "I… I can hear you…"
"Okay, well… just stay there for a second. You need to make sure you're… I don't know… God, I don't know. Can you see my hand? Can you see how many fingers I'm holding up?" Cristina pressed.
Slowly, Meredith opened her eyes and looked at the blurry shapes that had been presented in front of her. "I… I don't know, um… four? Five?"
Cristina cursed, so clearly Meredith's answer had been wrong. "Look, um… let's… let's fix the rest. What else hurts? Can you focus on anything else besides your head?"
It was Meredith's head that was causing the majority of the pain but through the misery, she was able to feel something on her upper left thigh. "Um… this… this hurts…"
With some help from Mark, Meredith finally managed to drag herself into a sitting position and when she did, she realized that there was a large piece of metal sticking out of her upper left thigh. She did not know how Cristina and Mark had not seen it and there was a likely a better way to extract the sharp object but Meredith was not completely in the right state of mind. She pulled the metal out with one quick tug and along with it, came a fountain of blood, gushing out of Meredith's leg like a geyser.
"Crap!" Cristina shouted; she darted forward and pressed down on Meredith's leg to provide compression. "Crap, crap… why the hell did you do that, Mer?!"
"I… don't know," Meredith admitted; she was becoming increasingly lightheaded from the blood loss.
From behind, Mark was still allowing Meredith to lean up against him for support but he was also rushing around, desperately attempting to find something to use as a tourniquet. When he was apparently unsuccessful, Meredith felt him rip his own scrub top into pieces and toss them towards Cristina. "Here, see if this'll hold her off."
"Yeah, okay," Cristina acknowledged and Meredith felt something tight wrap around her leg, right above where the pain was the worst. "Okay… okay, how's that feel, Mer?"
"It feels… I don't know… it feels the same I guess…"
Someone rubbed Meredith's bandaged head, softly. "Okay… don't worry; you're gonna be okay. You're gonna be fine."
"W-We gotta find… we gotta find… Derek and… and Lexie," Meredith repeated.
"Yeah, we will," Mark said. "We'll find them. You need to take a breather though, first, okay? You might still have other injuries we don't know about… can you wiggle your fingers and toes for me?"
Meredith took a deep steadying breath and then moved her toes slightly. It was hard to see because her feet were covered with her usual sneakers but Mark must have seen movement of some kind because he did not sound too concerned. And then Meredith moved onto her fingers and waved them around.
"Okay, good. You're good; you're okay," Mark said.
"Are… are you… okay?" Meredith whispered. She found it hard to believe that anyone could survive a plane crash with no injuries whatsoever but stranger things had happened.
Mark smiled in a good-natured way; it was the same grin that he gave to patients in the emergency room when he was trying to convince them that their injuries were not as bad as they thought. "Nothing that's gonna keep me down long. Honestly… honestly, right now, I feel great."
There was a good chance that that was not going to last, of course. Mark had to be aware of that. Everyone knew about adrenaline and how many times, patients that came into the Seattle Grace emergency room were awake and confident that they were not injured at all. It was only once their heartbeats returned to normal that the accident victims bled-out and coded.
We could all be dying, Meredith realized. There was a true possibility that Lexie and Derek were already dead and even if they were still alive, that might not last. Any one of the surgeons could be bleeding internally at the moment but their adrenaline was preventing them from feeling the full extent of their pain.
But then again, what could the doctors do even if they knew exactly where each other were bleeding? There were no scalpels nearby, no sanitary operating rooms or suction machines. They were trapped in the middle of the woods and the sky was falling.
Meredith did not notice until Cristina had returned to her side that she had left at all, perhaps to tend to Arizona who had, at least, stopped screaming. Cristina placed her good hand on Meredith's shoulder, softly. "How are you feeling?"
"Um… I'm… I'm okay. I'm better," Meredith lied. She was hyperventilating, truly and completely scared out of her mind like she had been only once before, during the shooting. But Cristina and Mark had fixed the obvious problems. Yes, there were likely more, something as simple as a bad bruise or as complicated as a brain bleed. If Meredith was dying, though, then it was going to be her mission to find Lexie and Derek before she died.
"Are you sure?" Cristina said. "Does anything else hurt?"
"No," Meredith said. "At least… not yet… I'm fine. We should g-go now… we should go look for… for Derek and Lexie. They… they have to b-be here… somewhere, right?"
Cristina and Mark looked at each other and then the latter shrugged. "I mean… yeah, we're gonna go look, Mer… for sure. But maybe you should stay here. Stay with Arizona; she can't walk either."
Meredith glared at them. "Do you… do you really think you… g-guys are going to… to go look for my husband and sister and… I'm n-not going… to come? I can walk. I'm fine. H-Help me up."
It was actually easier than Meredith expected. She was still dizzy but with one quick tug, Mark was able to pull Meredith to her feet and she managed to remain vertical. Maybe it was because Meredith was blocking out all of her physical pain. She could feel her pain, she could suffer and die once Derek and Lexie were found.
As they trudged through the forest, Meredith leaning on Mark for assistance, she tried to search for landmarks. It was hard because her vision was still blurry but Meredith knew that no matter what happened to Derek and Lexie, none of the surgeons could afford to get lost. They had to eventually be able to find their way back to the plane wreckage where Arizona was, along with all of their supplies.
"DEREK! LEXIE! DEREK! LEXIE!" the trio of doctors screamed constantly but Meredith was so afraid that they were not loud enough. Derek and Lexie could be anywhere and Meredith's voice was not strong to begin with… what if they were not heard? What if the group never found each other?
But then again, how far could have Derek and Lexie traveled if they were honestly still alive? Derek had been sucked out the side of a plane, according to Cristina and Lexie was sitting in the back of the plane which had fallen off. How far up was the plane when the back had fallen off? It was, at the very least, on top of the trees…
"DEREK! LEXIE! DEREK! LEXIE!"
Meredith paused approximately ten minutes into their hike and leaned up against a tree. Her vision was going black. She had to rest or else she was going to pass-out… and it was just in that moment that Meredith's breathing quieted that she heard it… a soft, clanking noise and it could not be far away.
"Do you… do you… h-hear that?" she panted.
"Yeah… yeah, it's coming from over there somewhere," Mark said, pointing to their right.
There was no time to waste; Meredith and the others started moving again. It did not take long before they arrived at another pile of wreckage that looked like the rear end of the plane… could that mean that Lexie was nearby and making that sound?
Meredith inched closer to the wreckage and that is when she saw it. There was a person on the ground, her bottom half trapped underneath a large piece of machinery. The person had long, dark, tangled hair and she was weakly banging a seatbelt around to try and be heard. It was Meredith's little sister.
Mark must have known at the same time. "LEXIE!"
The three surgeons hurried down a short hill and then knelt beside Lexie who was gasping for air, her face pale white and covered in blood. "I… I knew… you'd show up."
Meredith leaned over her sister, in an attempt to assess injuries but was immediately shoved aside by Mark who was frantic. He felt Lexie's carotid artery to measure her pulse. "You're okay. You're okay, Lex; I'm right here. Er… d-do you know where you are?!"
"Um… I'm… I… I don't know… the… the plane… it… it fell… off," Lexie said.
"She's tachycardic and short of breath," Cristina whispered and she bent over, too, to assist Mark.
"Okay, how are you feeling down there?" Mark asked.
Lexie coughed and blood trickled out of her mouth. "Um… I'm… I'm great! I'm… awake and… and alert."
"Yeah? Good girl," Mark said but Meredith rolled her eyes. Lexie was not great and if Mark honestly believed her, then he was hopelessly blinded by love.
Cristina looked annoyed too, so she got on the other side of Lexie, away from Mark. "Okay, Lexie… since your ex is being an idiot, I need you to give me a rundown."
"Uh… both tibias… are broken. I think… m-my… my pelvis or… or my hip is… fractured, too," Lexie admitted before Mark could open his mouth. "M-My head was… g-gushing b-blood so… I'm g-guessing… some kinda… open… skull fracture. M-My… chest… feels like… it's g-gonna… explode. I… I think… my lung… collapsed and… and m-maybe a… a hemothorax. I… I can't… feel my… left arm and… and I d-don't… even know if… if it's… still… there."
"I can see your left arm… it's… it's still there," Meredith assured her, doing all she could to keep her own breathing under control. She did not want to worry Lexie who already appeared to be in shock but that was nearly impossible. Lexie was not an idiot and she had to know that there was a good chance she was dying.
Lexie could not die. She was 28 years old and she was Meredith's little sister. She was Lexie…
"Okay… t-that's… that's g-good! So… so… I g-guess all that's… left is… to… get this… off of… m-me?"
Mark nodded. "Yeah, come on, guys. We can do this together. Once she's stabilized… someone will need to run back to the plane. She needs water bottles; get all the water bottles you can carry and… and see if there's a first-aid kit. "
"Okay, but first I need someone to pop my shoulder back into place," Cristina said.
"Right, right, right. I'll do it," Mark volunteered. "Are you ready?"
Cristina momentarily froze. "No, hold on… okay, okay, do it!"
With one strong snap, Mark popped Cristina's shoulder back into its socket. Cristina screamed loudly; it doubtlessly hurt like hell and Lexie flinched out of fear.
Meredith smiled at her sister, trying to be encouraging for once. "Okay, now we're… we're gonna get you outta there… okay, Lex?"
"Okay, g-great," Lexie said.
"Yeah, so this is what we're gonna do," Mark said and stepped forward as leader again. "Mer, you and I are gonna push up on this thing as hard as we can. It doesn't matter if you pull a muscle or anything; we'll fix that later. We'll probably only be able to hold it for a second so when we do, then Cristina… you're gonna grab Lexie and pull her out."
Meredith nodded shortly in agreement; she was not going to be able to think of a better plan and Cristina whispered, "Okay."
All at once, their strategy was launched into motion. There were no more chances to be afraid; Mark yelled out, "One… two… three!"
Meredith pushed up on the plane wreckage as hard as she possibly could. She was naturally petite, small in stature and not very strong and that was all true when she had not just been in a plane crash. Needless to say, Meredith was unable to contribute much but somehow, Mark managed to lift the metal a fraction of an inch and Lexie gasped as the pressure was relieved.
Cristina tugged on Lexie quickly and had barely slid her out of harm's way when Mark and Meredith's strength gave out. Meredith collapsed; she was definitely going to pass-out now.
She was not sure if she did or not… Meredith's vision had gone black, that was for certain but she had a feeling she remained conscious the entire time before Cristina's arms were around her shoulders.
"Mer… Mer, talk to me!"
"...Ouch…" Meredith moaned and squeezed her eyes shut to control the dizziness.
"I know, you're okay. Just um… sit there and rest for a minute, okay? I'm gonna go get the water and… and the first aid kit and everything."
"Get one of the oxygen tanks, too. There's oxygen on a plane," Mark said. "And hurry!"
Cristina took off. After a few more seconds, Meredith was able to sit up, too, and she looked at Mark who was cradling Lexie, her head on his lap. "Is she… is she… okay?"
"She's losing a lot of blood. It looks like a depressed skull fracture and her legs are broken… arm's definitely got some nerve damage. I really hope she's wrong, for once… wrong about that hemothorax," Mark said.
Whether or not Lexie had a hemothorax, though, there was nothing that could be done for it until Cristina made it back with the supplies and even then, Meredith was not so sure about their odds. A hemothorax was an urgent medical emergency and difficult to treat in a proper hospital.
Still, Meredith tried to think optimistically, for Lexie. She attempted to block out the probable impending doom and that was easy enough because all Meredith really could do before Cristina returned was lean up against a tree and continue breathing. Meredith's head hurt so badly. Ever since freeing Lexie from the wreckage, her vision had remained blurry and her abdomen was throbbing.
You probably strained your cartilage while you were saving Lexie. You probably have fractured ribs, Meredith told herself. It was impossible to believe herself, however, when the more likely scenario was that Meredith's true pain was beginning to register, her adrenaline fading.
Maybe all of the surgeons were suffering from massive internal bleeding. If they were, a rescue team had to find them within the next hour or two to have any hope of survival.
Cristina stumbled back to the miniature campsite ten minutes later, a thin, green oxygen tank tucked under her good arm and water bottles stuffed in her scrub pockets. "This is all I could find… I have some gauze, a kind of… bandaging stuff but… I couldn't find any other first-aid stuff. The pilot thinks it probably got destroyed."
"Great," Meredith muttered.
"Yeah, well… at least we got water. We got water and… and oxygen," Mark said, although it was obvious that he was panicking as well. "Let's get her hooked up to the oxygen and then… and then, Yang, you can look at her chest, see what's going on."
"Y-Yeah, Lexie said… she said she thought… she might have a hemothorax," Meredith said. "And you're the… the cardio g-goddess. It's time to… to test your… skills."
"I'm not a cardio goddess yet, Mer… and… and there's nothing I could do for a hemothorax…"
"Yes, you are! R-Right now… you are… Cristina. Teddy trusted you… she trusted you enough to send you… to B-Boise as… as the sole… r-representative… for cardio. And right now… you have to believe… you're a cardio goddess… for my… little sister!" Meredith demanded.
Cristina had to know that; she nodded and rubbed her forehead, thinking. "Okay, okay… if it's a hemothorax, then she needs a chest tube and we have to drain the blood but there's no needles or tubing…"
Mark, who had just finished securing an oxygen mask over Lexie's nose and mouth, grabbed her scrub top and began tearing the fabric. "We're gonna look at her chest… let's… let's just start there."
It was better than nothing. Meredith assisted Mark in easing the shirt off of Lexie and then, ignoring the fact that her sister was sure to be embarrassed later, also removed her white, lacy bra so that she was bare. The damage was evident. Not only was Lexie's chest swollen and distended, but the skin on her left side was red and bruised, right around the area where her heart was located. It was a miracle that Lexie was still alive at all.
"It's… it's a hemothorax," Meredith said, her voice breaking with hopelessness.
"No, it's… well, maybe it's that, too but I think it's cardiac tamponade. It looks like the pericardium's about to burst," Cristina said.
"Are you sure?!" Mark pressed.
"I'm… 75 percent… no, 70 percent sure," Cristina said.
"Hell, no! No, that's not sure enough!"
"Well, if you want me to be sure, get me an ultrasound!"
Meredith ignored them both. "If we don't do anything… if we don't drain the… the p-pericardial sac and… and relieve the p-pressure… her heart is g-gonna stop. It'll… it'll explode."
"Drain her blood? With what? We don't even have an 18-gauge spinal needle," Mark said.
Meredith spun around, desperately and spotted a half-empty suitcase nearby which must have been tossed from the aircraft and landed near the back half of the plane. She tore through it and found a bottle of hairspray in Cristina's bag that had a tube inside. "We'll… um… take the top off this… use the tube; it's… it's better than nothing."
"Brilliant," Cristina acknowledged. "Sanitize it, Mer… I have some hand sanitizer in my pocket… and then either you or Mark should do it. I don't trust myself with this… this shoulder and my collarbone."
Mark scoffed. "I haven't touched a cardiac case in ten years and now isn't exactly the time to see if I remember my skills. This is all you, Meredith."
"B-But… but she's my sister!" Meredith cried.
"Doesn't matter. We're not operating under HIPAA right now. Unless you want your sister to die, you need to get in there and you need to fix her. Do you really wanna waste time arguing or do you wanna save your sister's life?" Mark asked.
"Fine… fine, I'll do it," Meredith said. There were not many options, at the moment. She wiped some of Cristina's hand sanitizer over the tubing and prayed that it was enough. "So… so what am I supposed to use to get in if we don't have a needle?"
This time, Mark was left speechless as well, but thankfully, Cristina was not. "We have a knife. I found one in the cabinet by the water. I know it won't be like a scalpel but it'll do the job."
Their plan had passed improbable and crossed into the land of impossible, in Meredith's opinion. She glanced at Mark whose face was white. "You want to dig into Lexie's chest with a hunting knife?!"
"What are our other options here, Mark?!" Cristina yelled and she removed the knife from her coat pocket. The weapon was not meant for anything except self-defense. Cristina was right, though; there were no other options so Meredith took the knife from her friend and positioned herself over Lexie, her hands quivering.
"Get yourself under control, Grey!" Mark warned. "You keep shaking like that, you're gonna kill her!"
"Okay, you… shut up. Mer needs to concentrate," Cristina ordered.
Mark pressed his face closer to Lexie's chest. "Is the tubing long enough?"
"I think so… I'm going in, um… subxiphoid," Meredith said.
"Are you sure? Grey, are you 100 percent sure about this?!"
Meredith tried to ignore him but regardless, the pressure to perform a medical procedure correctly had never been so high. Meredith knew that Lexie was still halfway conscious and she hated herself for what she was about to do to her little sister. She took a deep, steadying breath.
"Alright, Lexie, I… I need you to try not to move…"
Carefully, Meredith inserted the tip of the knife into the chest and without any anesthesia, Lexie instantly began screaming and thrashing.
Mark reacted before Meredith could. "WHAT DID YOU DO?! WHAT THE HELL DID YOU DO TO HER?!"
"HOLD HER, PLEASE!" Meredith begged and somewhere in the back of her mind, she thought she could hear Cristina comforting Lexie, telling her that it was going to be okay.
Mark was continuing to scream, his face inches from Meredith's hand. "LEXIE! LEXIE! OH MY GOD, COME ON… LEXIE, YOU GOTTA STAY WITH ME!"
"Aim for her left shoulder," Cristina instructed as Meredith began to weave the tubing inside.
"GOD DAMMIT, MEREDITH; DON'T PUNCTURE HER HEART!" Mark yelled.
"I know, I know, I know…"
Meredith pushed the plastic a fraction of an inch further and as soon as she did, she knew that she had done it. The tube filled quickly with Lexie's blood which sprayed outwards, covering all six surgeons and their surrounding area like a crime scene.
Okay that's it for now! Chapter 3 will be coming soon (we should find out where Derek is in that one) so in the meantime, leave reviews and favorite! Love you all.