Meredith was enshrouded in a deep, painful ditch of unwilling persistence and desperately forced hope. She felt lost. The room was dark and the weight of the heavy unforgiving atmosphere hung at her shoulders and nipped at her heart. Her hands shook, her body quaking beneath her. She had gotten over the denial and adrenaline stage and had now seeped into the pure fear and unknowing hope stage, a stage she wasn't open to nor glad to be in. Every muscle in her body felt weak, as if it would give out without a moments notice. She could feel every heartbeat echo in her ears. The low throbbing noise rose to a whine, a mocking reminder that her heart was beating faster and faster in each empty moment. She could no longer approach the situation with the simple, loose-limbed stride of someone with no experience, no feelings. She willed her whole being into it, blinking furiously.
Her mind was racing. She raced through every aspect of her training, every textbook she had read, every practice, every drill they had done. It seemed as if the solution was on the tip of her tongue, yet she couldn't reach it, couldn't bring herself to think of it. Although she knew that wasn't true, the fear and maddening notion was infuriating. There had to be something she could do. Had to be. The dazed, distant, empty look that Derek held in his eyes was terrifying her. Fear reflected darkly.
Meredith didn't have much of a religious background. She didn't know much about much surrounding subject. Derek was, though, but he didn't bring it up with Meredith often. Suddenly, although she barely could tell things apart about the subject of religion, she felt something. She licked her lips and thought. Hard. Whoever you are up there, her thoughts attacked her, a desperate effigy of trying to grasp something she didn't know. Please, please help me. Please. Don't let him leave me. Please. What was she doing? She didn't even know what she was saying. She was trying everything. Please, please, please…
Tears bit at her eyes as she blinked back to reality, the shaken and unutterable reality that she didn't want to come back to…ever. She gazed down at him. Although his eyelids hung lower, signifying a nerve-wracking distant, hollow look, they were still open. Open was better than closed. Right? "Derek, stay awake. Help will be here soon, I know it," Meredith demanded at him, holding him as she sat on the cold floor. One arm wrapped around him tightly, in a heart-wrenching embrace, and the other pressed to the wound on his shoulder. She bit her lip to keep from crying again. She had to stay strong.
"Baby?" His uncoordinated and uncooperative tongue finally sloshed around enough to form a word. Although in a daze, his brain was still functioning. Good.
"Yes, Derek…" Meredith whispered, clinging tighter to him and hoping some meek pressure she had to offer was calming him. "I'm pregnant."
"You're…" He began, his unfamiliar voice being cut of by a deep choking cough. He coughed again, a deep rumble coming from his core. "Preg…" The word was lost in his throat.
"Yes," Meredith agreed to him, using one of her hands to squeeze his. "We're having a baby. You and me. But if that's going to happen, there needs to be a me and you, okay? Stay awake, Derek."
"I'm… I'm trying…" He sighed, trying to tense his muscles and contract them enough to let himself move. He bit his lip, but Meredith used her clean hand to stroke his face gently, caressing his cheekbones under her dancing fingers. The fear in his eyes sent an icy array of goose bumps up her spine.
"I love you…" He said gently, quietly, and meaningfully. "You've changed my life."
"You're okay, you're okay, just lie down," She said softly, wishing with every bone in her body that she would calm down. Her nerves were far passed rattled. They were frayed, broken, snapped. She begged and pleaded for him to keep his eyes open, to try and stay alert. Although she was sure that was next to impossible, she still had to try.
He seemed content for a moment, blinking his eyes and letting his strained lips collapse into a more relaxed state. He took a deep breath and sunk back into her comforting embrace. Suddenly, abruptly, he gasped. The shock was gone. The pain was there. He gasped, as if clawing for oxygen, choking on his own ragged breaths. Meredith's face went blank, the color pooling down. He reached his left hand quickly to touch the wound, looking up at the returning fingers. Crimson splayed across them. A horrid pain bit his body and he suddenly lurched forward, his shoulder creating a unnatural arch. He cried out, "I…I…I'm shot! Meredith!" He panicked, his fingers scrabbling across the floor.
Tears returned to Meredith's glimmering eyes. Where was the backup? "You're okay, Derek! Just calm down!" Although the adrenaline was somewhat muting the extent of his injuries, Meredith could see the sheer fear in his eyes. Her stomach churned at the amount of terror that stared back at her.
"Meredith!" He yelled in a breathless cry, panting, choking. An embarrassing, choking yell he couldn't help erupted from his lungs as he thought about Chris, the way he had looked at him…
Say goodbye.
"I know, Derek, I know it's scary," Her shaking words didn't seem to calm him. She added frantically, "I need you to breath, Derek, I need you to breathe! Please!" Please.
"I…I…I…" Derek's unfinished sentence tortured him, he grasped for words that didn't seem to ever come off of his tongue. Meredith squeezed him as she held him, tears flooding down her cheeks in waves.
"I know, Derek," She cried, tightening her grip. "Please breathe, I'm right here."
He choked on more air, staring up at her with wide, terrified eyes. Finally, he seemed to calm a little. His breaths were becoming increasingly labored though, and he blinked rapidly. His eyesight was blinded by panic.
"Eighteen years ago, my father died…. Because of the A&O." And after that, he let his head collapse into his hands again, and his body was a wreck of dry heaves and helpless sobs. He could barely feel Meredith's small hands rubbing his back as he mumbled against the heat of hands, "I'm so sorry, Meredith, I'm so sorry…"
"It's okay," Her voice said distantly. "It's okay. You're going to be okay."
A pledge.
As Meredith held onto him tighter, a screeching noise interrupted the repeated sound of his sputtering breaths and inaudible words. SECURITY BREECH. SECURITY BREECH. INTRUDER ALERT. The words rang in Meredith's head, and she blinked. Backup must be here. Backup must be here and they were going to help them. Derek would finally be-
Her thoughts were interrupted by another loud warning that rang from the speakers overhead. LOCKDOWN IN PLACE, AREA SECURE. She froze, barely processing the muffled noise that echoed from the right of her. The thick, grey, sliding door to the small room made an angry squeal. Her eyes widened, flooded by panic. "No…no…" The squealing door finally snapped shut, sliding and clicking into place.
They were locked in.
LOCKDOWN COMMENCED.
"No…no…" Meredith stammered loudly to herself. She gently placed Derek back down with trembling fingers, trying to scramble to her shaking feet.
"Mer, what's…" Derek started, and then was interrupted with an attack of coughs.
When Meredith finally found her way to her feet she scrambled over to the thick, daunting door, she slapped her hands against the cold metal. She used every muscle in her body and tried to pull, but her sweaty hands simply slipped against the invisible grain of the metal. She clenched her teeth, tears welling in her eyes. She kicked the door. Pulled. Pressed her back against it. "No…" She scrabbled at it pointlessly with her nails, but the door was locked in place. It was stuck in an abhorrent, terrifyingly, undeniably frozen.
They were locked in.
She slammed her fists against the metal but it didn't make a mere noise. She heard Derek's labored breaths in the background with a few pained coughs sprinkled in. She kicked again at the door, sending her entire weight behind it. Her foot throbbed painfully after slamming against the solid door. Tears stung her eyes. "No!" She screamed, her shriek echoing off the walls of the room. "NO!" She pressed her hands against the door harder, trying to lean in with all of her weight and willpower. "NO! NO!" She cried, tears streaming down her face and cascading off of her chin in a waterfall. Hope was lost. She kicked and screamed and yelled, her bangs sticking to her cheeks as more tears fell. She pressed her face against the cool, smooth metal, hitting her forehead against it a few times as her hands slid down the door. Her body was heaving in a mess of sobs, her breath catching in her throat.
Derek's muffled voice came from behind her, "We're…we're…" Cough. "Locked…" The intensity and volume of his words debilitated even more, but the fear remained. His eyes glimmered, biting his lip as he stared unknowingly at the ceiling.
Please.
She gave up. She spun on her heals, falling next to him onto her knees, trying to maintain her furiously shaking composure. "Derek, I…" She murmured, her voice a trembling chunk of held-in sobs. "Derek, I'm so- I'm so- Sorry, Derek!" She couldn't hold it in, not even for him. The tears fell and the cried loudly, pulling his battered figure into the folds of his arms. She lost more than half her heart. She felt tears form unwelcome clumps in the base of her throat.
He blinked, not responding for a moment, but tears filled to the brim of his decrepit eyes it broke Meredith's heart in such a way, it was as if it had shattered. He blinked and a single tear fell, and Meredith could feel her entire composure begin to fall loose. His eyelids lowered, looking even heavier. It was as if trying to hold them up was like trying to carry the weight of the world. Her heartbeat stuttered in her ears.
A sudden realization snapped furiously into Meredith's brain. He was giving up.
"No, Derek, Derek, no!" She yelled suddenly, blinking the tears away from her eyes. "You stay awake! You don't get to give up, Derek! You don't get to give up!"
He blinked his eyes and looked up into hers, filled with sorrow and worry and fear and regret and a mix of sickening emotions that made Meredith's heart do a nosedive in her chest. "Derek Shepherd, stay awake now!" She wished her words had even the slightest salubrious meaning, but they were simply to encourage his willpower. "Derek!" She yelled with all of her heart. Please, let him stay with me!
His eyes blinked rapidly open as if with a prompt, and he looked up at her. "Sorry…" He sputtered between wet coughs. Meredith's tears blurred her vision and she clutched him tighter, burying her head into his chest as she pulled him nearer.
"You're okay… you're okay…" She hummed. The words had been spoken to such magnitude that they were barely words anymore. Meredith prayed he could understand her, or that he took some sort of solitude or safety in her arms. She blinked her eyes and gazed at him. He looked back, offering the weakest smile that he possibly could. "I love you. I love you so much. Stay awake, okay?" These words were spoken to their truly deepest meaning, and Derek seemed to understand that.
"Yeah," He said quietly. The agony of the helplessness nipped at him. He blinked and used his left hand to cling tighter to her forearm that gripped him. The moments that passed seemed like hours. Meredith sat with the person she loved the most, the person that had literally saved her life, in her arms. "I…I love…"
But Derek's weak thought was interrupted by the sound of a crash.
It was Cristina and Alex. They stood at the broken down door, breathing heavily and heartily. They both intently and fearfully stared, wide eyed at the two crumpled figures on the floor. Cristina's eyes flickered from Meredith, then back to Derek, then back to Meredith. Meredith felt her whole being surrender as she numbly watched Cristina skid over to them, ushering Izzie in behind her as they began to assess and take care of Derek. They lifted him and pulled him up as he staggered and moaned. Meredith was experiencing it all in a thick daze, her nerves frayed with fear and stunned emotion like never before. Her whole body was a shaking mess and she stared at nothing in particular. She barely felt Alex's arms around her in a whole-hearted hug, warmth crawling back into Meredith's body. She held up her soiled hands in a weak surrender, closing her eyes. She cried, sobbed, her body heaving messily into Alex's shoulder, as the shock of it all swept across her.
A/N: What did you think? It was really hard for me to write this. Seriously. I can't even describe it. I hope it hit some of you deep, I hope it touched your emotions- let me know how I did. Reviews keep me encouraged and keep me going.
Thank you for reading!