¸.·´¸.·*´¨) ¸.·*¨)(¨*·.¸)¨´*·.¸´·.¸ Runaway World ¸.·´¸.·*´¨) ¸.·*¨)(¨*·.¸)¨´*·.¸´·.¸
12. Dear Vienna

This isn't my favoritest (not sure that's a word, but whatever) chapter ever, but it kinda had to happen. Everyone's reviews make me feel warm and fuzzy inside, and make me write even when I don't feel like it. Although usually, I feel like it. I just have too many stories right now. Anyway Dear Vienna is a song by Owl City. Enjoy!

Twenty-eight Years Ago: The Plan

"Slow down, Mark! You'll fall!" A five year old Nancy Shepherd yelled as the swift feet of two boys splattered her with mud, soiling her pale pink dress. "Derek!"

"You can't come with us, Nance," Derek said, puffing out his chest. He was only two years older than Nancy, but he was over a head taller and Mark was taller still. "Boys only!"

"Yeah, sorry," Mark agreed, beginning down the steep bank of the creek where Carolyn Shepherd's children, including Mark, were forbidden to go. Rocks tumbled down with him, but he kept his balance, throwing tanned arms out to keep from falling. Finally, he skidded to a stop at the bottom, running into the cool creek.

"Please, Derek?" Nancy pleaded, chocolate eyes wide, but Derek only shook his head and followed Mark. These moments made him feel like death was sitting on his shoulder. The small cliff, although steep for two seven year old boys, would be easily traversed by an adult. Sometimes he and Mark pretended they were flying.

But in his haste to get away from his sister, he slipped down too fast. His toe hit a rock at the very end and he went flying, truly taking to the bluebell colored sky. Derek was sure, in that second, that he would meet an untimely death just like his father. He expected all seven years of his life to flash before his eyes, giving him a glimpse of every childhood fight, every Christmas, every birthday, and he would see his father … but all he ended up seeing was a short scene of the azure sky mixing in with brilliant green trees …

And then Derek felt a small but strong force grab the back of his shirt, and he looked to see Mark. Blushing and embarrassed because Mark had made the slide without falling, Derek could only nod in thanks. Mark didn't seem to mind, but as Derek studied his best friend, he noticed something had fallen out of Mark's shirt when he'd moved so quickly to catch Derek – a necklace.

He probably should have been grateful to Mark for saving his life, or at least his face, but, prompted by needling humiliation, Derek pointed at the key dangling in front of Mark's chest. "What's that, a necklace? Maybe you should have stayed behind with Nancy."

Mark, who got in fights every other week at school, who hid frogs in the teacher's desk to make her scream, simply shrugged serenely. "It's not for me. It's for the girl I love someday." He said this with such complete confidence that Derek's mouth fell open. Jealousy overtook him – how could Mark know these things, be so sure? Still, Mark knew nothing about girls. Derek was the one with four sisters, Mark didn't understand the inner workings of women.

"That's stupid," Derek said, kicking the dirt. He peeked at Mark's reaction. Was it stupid? Or should he find some sort of necklace too?

"Maybe it is," Mark conceded in a voice that indicated he was just humoring Derek. "But my grandmother told me to do it before she died, so I'm going to."

Derek snorted, but he would wish, twenty-eight years later to be exact, that he hadn't been so skeptical. Because Mark gave that necklace to Derek's future wife before Derek ever met her. And she gave it to her son, and the next time he saw that necklace it was hanging around Sage Montgomery's neck, and it was only a matter of time before he put the pieces together.

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The strange, enigmatic exhaustion had barely dragged her down again when a gentle tap on her shoulder woke her. She had been dreaming of a previous life, when Mark's arm around her shoulders had not drawn curious glances. During the two brief, shining months in New York when she had been able to call him hers, guilt was in constant equilibrium with happiness. Those months were up for a rehash in every aspect of the word, but there was no way for her to know it yet.

"Mom," Sage whispered, tapping her shoulder. "Mom!" That word roused her like nothing else could – part of it was the unfamiliarity, part of it was the boy saying it.

She sat up, lingering sleep spinning her thoughts in circles. "What is it?" she mumbled. "Are you okay?"

"I think I'm sick," the boy said, his voice dry and cracking. She felt for his hand, seeking to console him, and found him burning hot, like he had embers smoldering under his skin. She swung her feet over to the side of the bed, getting slowly to her feet while keeping hold of his blazing hand. Both she and Sage wore old t-shirts, and she felt a strange twinge as she realized they had once been Mark's.

"Come on," she told Sage, and mother and son crept through Derek and Meredith's silent house. His steps were halting, inhibited by sickness, and she caught his burning body as he stumbled. Tortured jade eyes tugged at her heart and she stared around the unfamiliar house. Though Derek had come here many times during her stay in Seattle, she'd never seen the inside of casa de intern. She dug Advil out of the pantry, hoping to reduce the raging fever, but after watching him sprint to the bathroom, she was unsure whether he could keep it down.

Instead she sank down on the couch, cradling her only child in her arms, hanging onto him as if that could stop the shivers that wracked his small body. Technically, this was his first night as her son. His immune system was probably shot from all the recent surgery and trauma and soon he was too weak to even sit up.

"Mom, I'm so cold," he said, his voice alarming soft.

"I know," she whispered back, feeling his forehead. How hot could his body be allowed to burn before he needed to go to the hospital? Addison hoped she was just being paranoid, but seeing her child suffer was indescribably unpleasant. He spilled over the edges of her lap, having already grown too big to fit there, and sweat soaked his borrowed t-shirt, but eventually he fell into an unsettled slumber.

Meredith and Derek found them there several hours later, nestled in the shadows caused by approaching dawn. Her bare foot was pressed up against the bowl she'd gotten for him, and they were swaddled in a thick blanket. To her relief, Sage's breathing had become smooth and peaceful, and his head wasn't quite so hot. "Addie, you're going to get sick," Derek said.

"I don't care," she said, and it was true. There had been nobody before to take care of her son, she thought as she smoothed crimson curls from his forehead. And she was going to do it now.

The sun had barely peeked her face over the shape of the earth when she found herself bent over the porcelain basin. Proximity to Sage had allowed the sickness to jump from him to her, although that was no fault of his. She'd been unable to resist cradling his fevered body through every hour, and now she was sick as well.

Footsteps echoed down the hallway, and Addison moved aside just in time for Meredith, who bent over the toilet, retching. After a minute she sat back, joining Addison against the wall.

"Well, this should be interesting," Meredith said ruefully, managing a small smile. "Want me to hold your hair?"

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Derek smiled contentedly as he walked out of his patient's room. Every time he saved someone, it was like walking on top of an effervescent, golden bubble: a candle burned in this dark world for at least a little longer.

He was also secretly relieved to be out of Meredith's house, which had been transformed into some sort of home for the sick. He'd taken care of Addison for years, and of course didn't mind caring for his fiancée, or Sage. But access to a bathroom was nice. It seemed either Addison or Meredith were throwing up, trading off every instant. Sage only laid on the couch, riding out his fever, but he'd been sick enough under the twinkling, watchful stars as Addison fretted and eventually got sick too.

Truthfully, they all looked so pathetic that it was hard to justify going to work, but Meredith had cheerfully kicked him out. It looked like she was planning something with Addison, but he supposed he was getting what he deserved for inviting his ex-wife and her son to live with them. Maybe he could get Sage to tell him what they were going to do.

He smiled as he thought of Sage. Though the boy was not his, he hoped to have a son someday. The energetic, redheaded kid reminded him of himself and Mark as kids, of days spent running wild and free, like young boys did. Days filled with bugs and mud and trucks and secrets … secrets.

Derek stopped in the middle of the hallway, the realization crushing him as effectively as a wayward meteor might. Sage, Mark, his childhood … and a crystal key that reflected rainbows from every facet. A key that Derek had once teased Mark about, and a key that had been around Sage's neck that very morning.

But that was impossible – Sage could not be Mark's son. Mark hadn't given the key to him, because Mark didn't know he had a child. But Sage had Mark's necklace, given to him by his last living relative that had cared for him. It was too flawless to be coincidence. That meant … that meant that Mark had given the key to Addison. That meant Mark and Addison had met before he had met her.

The woman Mark had searched for so fruitlessly, had combed every bar and pub for, was Addison. Hadn't she told him just the other day that once upon a time she'd been blonde? That also meant that when he'd met Addison in a coffee shop in New York, she'd been pregnant with Mark's baby. And Addison and Mark sleeping together when they were married wasn't so much of a betrayal, just an inevitable correcting of what was meant to be.

Derek felt like he'd been punched in the stomach, or maybe like someone had stolen his stomach. Suddenly, he felt he was just as much of a projectile vomit hazard as Addison or Meredith. Addison, who for eleven years had been his wife, was Mark's girl all along.

"It's for the girl I love someday." His girl, their girl.

There was more, it got worse, Mark had kept more promises than he'd ever meant to …

"So you think you're just going to waltz in a sweep her off her feet," Derek stated, sarcasm revealing how ludicrous he found the idea.

"No, I … I don't know her name. But she's out there, Derek, and I'm going to find her."

Just as quickly as his insides had congealed, effectively trapping him in place, they suddenly thawed, leaving him free to seek out his best friend, his enemy, his brother. He wasn't sure how long he searched before Mark emerged from the men's bathroom. Derek wasn't as big nor as tall as Mark, that hadn't changed from the time they were boys. But muscles and height were a poor defense against disbelief, betrayal and anger, and Derek pinned him up against the wall.

"Where were you in April of 2000?" he growled, having done the mental math in his head.

"What the fuck are you doing, Shep? Get off me," Mark said, but Derek was as solid as stone in his realization, and he would not budge.

"Just tell me where you were, Mark." His voice boded no argument, he would not, could not accept it until if such a wild imagination could actually be correct. His heart spoke to him, telling him there was no need to interrogate Mark, he knew the truth. But Derek had to hear it aloud. It was so impossible, like something from a fairytale. He and Meredith had their fairytale. Hard as it was, he had to admit that maybe Mark and Addison deserved theirs too.

Mark thought, rubbing his sparse stubble, clearing having decided that arguing with Derek would get him nowhere. "Uh, Greece, I think," he finally said. "Yeah, April I was definitely in Greece. What the hell is this about, Derek?" Mark asked as Derek released him and turned away.

At that moment, Derek controlled the strings of Mark Sloan's life, and was able to manipulate them to his will. What would he say, if Derek told him he had a son? It was only right that he unveiled the truth for everyone, that he drew back the curtains so another love story besides his own could go on. He opened his mouth to say the words, but they stuck in his throat. It was inexplicable besides the possibility that it wasn't his discovery, his life, his child. Mark and Addison needed to figure it out for themselves.

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Vision spun underneath his eyelids, woven by the fever. He closed his eyes against the shadows, having lost the ability to tell what was real and what was imagined. Strange figures, present only in dreams, watched him as the heat grew.

He finally figured out that he was hallucinating. The colors playing out in front of him were not real. But what was? Was his mother, bending over him to put a fresh, cool washrag on his forehead a dream too? She looked too solid, clutching her stomach in her too big t-shirt, but maybe he was wrong. Maybe his brain had been truly messed up by the surgery.

Addie's hand on his forehead, stroking his hair and feeling for fever, and Meredith bringing him fresh cups of ginger ale every few minutes reminded him of long days in the boy's home, when everyone was sick. The beds stacked high with ill boys, sweaty limbs tangled, closed off from the others so the sickness wouldn't spread. There had been no one to bring him iced drinks then, no one to hold him and whisper that it would be all right.

They'd opened windows, letting the breeze curls around the sick bodies of boys. He laid in whatever bed he could find, wishing he was able to run through the grass again, and wishing his parents hadn't lost him. The older ones pushed the younger ones aside, shoving them for better beds, disregarding the aching of their feverish limbs. Medicine was in short supply, water splashed over shivering bodies.

He shuddered and focused in on Mer and Addie again. Both were more mobile, able to stand at least, and chatted in hushed voices. The world was hazy, lights strange, the world spinning whenever someone moved, mostly one of the women getting up to throw up.

It was impossible to be comfortable, even with his head on his mother's lap. He could only lay and wait for his sickness to fade. The day was so strange, it was impossible to imagine it was only going to get stranger.

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Of all the places she'd expected to go in her life, and of all the things she thought she'd do, helping Addison Montgomery care for her sick son in her and Derek's house was not one of them. The boy's fever flamed out of control and Meredith didn't think little Sage deserved any more pain, nor that Addison should have to watch him endure it.

Addison flopped down, exhausted, as Sage finally slept again. Her voice was hoarse with tiredness as she said, "I don't think we have what he has after all. His fever is in the hundreds now." Her face was tender as she watched her son, counting each breath.

"Yeah," Meredith agreed. "I don't feel quite as bad now." She sat silently for a minute before deciding, perhaps irrationally, to ask the question that was bubbling out of her throat. "What's it like? Suddenly finding out you're a mother, I mean."

Addison looked surprised but not at all offended. She sighed. "I have no idea what I'm doing," she muttered. "I don't know how to be a parent. My parents were never around. My dad was at the office all the time, screwing his various secretaries when he wasn't working. My mother was, and is still, the epitome of socialite. She's interfering now, but I was left to a nanny when I was a child. So I guess … I'm just going to try to give Sage the childhood I always wanted but never had."

So she wasn't the only lost, abandoned child. Addison had been neglected and unloved as well, and Sage had been too, before he was found. "I'm sure you'll be a brilliant mother," she said, noticing how resolute the other woman seemed her claim to be what she herself had never had.

"You would too," Addison complimented. "Have you and Derek ever talked about having kids?"

Meredith rolled over on the couch, hitching up the pajama bottoms she'd stolen from Derek. "We've talked about having a baby eventually. Maybe after we're married. But I – my mother wasn't exactly the caring sort either," she admitted, and Addison smiled sympathetically.

"I know the feeling. But this is my only chance to be a mother, so I'm going to do the absolute best job I can."

It felt weird, getting such insights to Addison's life. It was like washing off a coating of paint so thick that few people had attempted it before. Addison revealed details of her like only under extreme conditions, to people she trusted. Under her flawless masquerade, she was just like anyone else. Any other pretenses were probably an attempt to cover up years of pain, Meredith thought. She did the same thing. Being scary and damaged had been easier, for so many years, than being hurt again. "What do you mean, your only chance?" she asked.

Addison bit her lip and avoided Meredith's storm colored eyes, like she carried a painful weight on her shoulders that was difficult to voice. Meredith blushed slightly, having unwittingly crossed an invisible line. Addison's hand fluttered to her stomach, and when she spoke, undiluted sadness rang out through her voice. "I can't have any more children," she said, expression wistful. "The first time I went to LA, it was to have a baby, but I found out I couldn't."

It was like she and Addison were digging down deep into their lives. Occasionally they'd strike gold, find a vein, but instead of a vein of precious metal, it was a vein of sadness. "I'm sorry," she said, trying to inject as much empathy into her voice as she could. "That really sucks."

"Yeah, well, I don't mind so much now that I have Sage," Addison said, bestowing a smile on her sleeping son. Sick as he was, his face was still lovely, and Meredith couldn't help wondering who had fathered the boy. Because although Addison was beautiful too, Sage's features favored someone else's. "I have enough on my plate taking care of him right now. He needs me."

Still, to not be able to have a baby … it awakened kind of a wistful longing, bringing up a child with Derek's dark hair and blueberry eyes. Meredith could tell that despite Addison putting on a brave face, she still wanted a baby. And to be honest, well, she wanted a baby too.

"That's why Derek and I never had kids," Addison whispered. "I could never get over loosing Sage, no matter how many times Derek mentioned wanting a baby. I already had a baby, he was just lost. Anyway, enough about imperious mothers and lost children. How's the engagement going?"

Meredith laughed, never have imagined discussing her relationship with Derek with Addison. But Izzie was too wedding obsessed to hear about anything else and Cristina claimed she's had enough of hearing about Derek's 'McDreaminess.' "Good. It's all coming together. And Derek is past his depression thing now, so things are great. We can talk, and I'm not afraid, and the sex is … excellent," she said in a muted tone, blushing as Sage gave a particularly loud snore.

Addison chuckled, ocean colored eyes filled with mirth. "Good for you for getting some, Grey," she laughed, sweeping her red waves, which were growing out from her short bob, back. "I haven't slept with anyone since …" her voice faltered as her cheeks were suddenly flooded in red.

"It's okay," said Meredith quickly, standing up and heading for the fridge. Derek had left lasagna in there, and it smelled divine, but she wasn't sure how well it would sit with her stomach. "You don't have to tell me, I –"

"Since Mark," Addison confessed with a groan, like she had committed murder. "I told myself I wouldn't, that I shouldn't, but …" The room seemed full of her declaration, like it couldn't be contained. Mark's with Lexie, Meredith thought, but then she remembered that they broke up, briefly, because Mark wouldn't tell Derek. Not because he was afraid, like Lexie had assumed, but because of Addison.

The tangled web they wove was only getting worse.

"I think I love him," Addison said. "But I shouldn't. I really, really shouldn't and I shouldn't be telling you either, because he's dating your sister."

Saying the words felt like a betrayal, like she was stabbing Lexie from behind, but they rang with truth. "I don't think Mark feels about Lexie the way he feels about you, whether she's my half-sister or not." Belatedly she remembered that Addison was the one who had discovered that she had sisters in the first place. But things were so different then, like they were in a different era …

"He loved me once, but he doesn't anymore," Addison said quietly.

"I think he d-" She began, but not before a key turned in the lock and the door burst open. Well, speak of the devil.

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Nostalgia was painful, Mark discovered as he and Derek walked in to find three very sick people occupying the couches. How many times had he taken care of Addison when she was sick and Derek couldn't be bothered? Derek went straight to Meredith, embracing her and kissing her lips softly. She protested, saying that he would get sick as well, but he replied that he didn't mind.

Sage was wrapped in blankets, his golden skin flushed with sickness, and a mysterious protectiveness rose up in Mark. What about this boy made him want to be better, made him more of the man he'd always wanted to be? He tucked a corner of the blanket closer around the small body, trying to be inconspicuous about it, but he caught Addison watching him, and the expression in her eyes, though tinged with fierce caring, was mostly unreadable.

Even sick, copper curls mussed and tangled, she was still undeniably the most gorgeous thing he'd ever seen. Angelic. Seraphic. Perfect, but in a razor sharp, cutting way: he recognized the old t-shirt she was wearing, probably leftover from the times he'd stayed in her hotel room last time she'd been in Seattle.

Still, he felt sort of like a peeping tom when the sight of her legs, extending for miles out of the shirt, set his thoughts afire. That was wrong when she was sick, wasn't it? It was even more wrong in light of the fact that he had a girlfriend. But Mark couldn't make himself care.

"I brought you something," he said, holding out the white dish in his hand. Raspberry sorbet. Her favorite, when she was sick. He would know. Luckily, it hadn't melted too much. She tried to look uninterested, but her stomach gave her away, growling like an animal. He sat beside her, offering her the bowl of ice cream and then a spoon, trying not to think of how Addison looked while eating ice cream should be considered a crime. Her lips were berry red within seconds.

Mark tried to resist, to be good, but she was intoxicating. She leaned her tired head on his shoulder, and he shifted her legs so they rested on his lap. Addison didn't pull back, sickness always made her vulnerable. Meredith glanced at her, a smug expression in her eyes, but Mark was nonplussed.

"Got any more?" she asked when she'd cleaned out the bowl.

"I thought you were supposed to be sick," he asked, slightly amused but also to distract himself. Derek was studying Sage. At first Mark thought that the boy didn't warrant such a medical assessment, he clearly had the flu, but as Derek's gaze shifted to him, it was like he was comparing them.

"I am sick. And hungry. I -" Before she could finish the sentence, his cell phone rang. He answered it with out thinking, not realizing that all the people he could ever wish to talk to were right in front of him.

"Hello?"

"Mark?" Lexie said, sounding annoyed. "Where are you?"

"What do you mean, where am I?" he asked for lack of a better answer. He felt caught, like a cornered animal, despite the fact that he technically wasn't doing anything wrong.

Lexie's tone was probably meant to be pleasant, but the suspicion was too concentrated. "I just wanted to meet after work, so I need to know where you …"

Mark held the phone away from his ear. "Joe's or hospital?" he said, thinking aloud and trying to figure where he should say he was. Obviously he could not say Derek's house. Because surely Lexie knew that Addison and Sage were staying there, and he had avoided any discussion about his and Addison's past because it opened a Pandora's box of forbidden want and hidden pain.

"I'm at Joe's," he decided, hoping she was still at work. She didn't argue, so he figured she believed him. She said she was heading over to Joe's in a few minutes, which left him no choice to rush over so he would not be caught in a lie. It felt like he was relapsing, heading back to days were he juggled more lies than he could count. But this was different, Addison didn't want him, she just needed a friend. And he was there, yanked to her by their connection, she the planet, he the rotating moon. If he knew why she was really sick, he might feel guiltier about lying to Lexie, but he didn't. She was like a drug that he couldn't resist. Just a little more.

He just needed one more minute.

I can't really leave an author's note at the end. I'll just say things blow up next chapter. Like big, big explosions.