H 38 Fighting for what is right

Meredith sat at her desk organising the successive shifts of residents and attendings covering the E.R. the following day. Doctors not scheduled to surgeries each had a time-slot alotted to them, with a few off-call doctors penciled in in the case of a crisis, when extra hands might be needed. It was always better to be prepared.
She turned her head to the clock pinned up on the wall above her door.

3:00 A.M.

Stiffling a yawn and shaking the exhaustion out of her limbs, she turned once again towards the still half-empty schedule. The E.R. schedule. that was no longer for the following day, but now the present one.
Sighing in frustration, Meredith rubbed her tired eyes and tried to concentrate once more. She really had to get through this now. She had planned on finishing this before midnight, obviously unsuccessfully. But really, she had to get through it as quickly as possible, so that once her morning shift started, she would able to concentrate on more pressing matters. Namely the Helen Crawford Case.

Which meant she had to stop thinking about the Helen Crawford case right now and finish up this schedule, as well as the inventory of which E.R. supplies needed replenishing. But it was absolutely no use. Try as she might, she couldn't get either Derek or Helen out of her brain. That, along with the grueling fatigue she was cowering under, made it extremely difficult to focus on a task as boring as administrative planning. The Helen Crawford case, which her tired mind was unable to push away for the time being, throbbed in her head, like her very own sagittal tumour.

The whole situation was truly headache inducing. Everything about it was wrong.

There was the fact, first and foremost, that the patient in question was a neurological legend, one of the pioneering women in her field, much like Ellis Grey had been in her own career. With the significant difference between the two , of Helen not being a total bitch. Which meant that quite apart from seeing her as an idol professionally, Meredith had to admit, she hadn't been able, even in the hour or so of contact she'd had with her, to prevent herself from getting attached to Helen Crawford the person. Which is why she sympathised with Derek's situation.

She wasn't stupid, or dense, and whatever Derek's insinuation to her during their last confrontation, she wasn't an unfeeling bitch. Quite the contrary. She could see the toll this was having on all parties concerned, and on Derek in particular. The friendship between the two neurological prodigies was obviously a very close one, and Meredith couldn't help but think that if it were Christina or Mike, she'd probably be acting in the exact same way. But that was precise the point she had been trying to make. Derek was reacting as a friend, and not a doctor. Which was the second problem.

There was absolutely no doubt in Meredith's mind that if anyone could perform a sagittal sinus bypass flawlessly in the crappiest of circumstances, it was probably Derek Shepherd. She knew how gifted he was. After all, she'd seen it and learnt from it first hand. But in this instance, the question for her was no longer if he could, but rather whether or not he should.

He had blatantly crossed the line in pressuring her to have the surgery and get treated on his terms rather than hers. That should have been warning one basic golden rule of any doctor was to keep his patient happy. They were scared and saw their life threatened, and it was your job to get them to trust you and let you do the best you could to save them. But you only ever went as far as they were willing to go. You couldn't push. Sure, you presented all the facts, gave your professional assessment on the matter and hoped they decided accordingly. But you let them decide. You abandoned to them that decision. Ultimately, they chose. And Derek had gotten in the way of that. He had guilt-tripped his friend into signing off on a risky surgery out of fear. And that, was a problem.
It wasn't the first time Meredith had seen something like this happen; family members and loved ones often held an influence over patients that it could seem hard to free them of. Indeed sometimes, it was a positive thing. When a family member gave a patient the will to fight. But then, there were the cases where it really was the patient's call on whether or not the fight was worth it, and this, was one of them.
As doctors, it was in cases like these, that it became their role to protect the patients from their loved ones. Secure them the liberty of their freewill. You had to be the patient's his voice, when he was too scared or tired to speak up. Such as pediatric cases where parents refused to end the unnecessary suffering they were causing their child out of love-induced refusal to accept the end.
But here everything was complicated by the patient's doctor being that very friend, that very loved one that Helen needed protecting from. Even if he was doing so with the best intentions, Derek was letting his professional judgment be clouded by his being Helen's friend.
Which brought Meredith to her next concern.

Derek had, in her opinion, absolutely no business treating this case. He was too attached, too implicated. And more than her concern for Helen, Meredith was terrified at the realisation that even heavier weighing on her shoulders in this, was her concern for Derek. Getting over attached to a patient was one of the worst things that could happen to a doctor. It lead to extra pressure, extra stress, which led to quickly made decisions, and in the case of failure, crippling amounts of self-blame.

However much she was angry at him, she could not, for all the love she felt for him, bring herself to sit by and watch as he did this to himself.

There was a reason doctors were prohibited from treating family. It was because of the effects it could have on the doctor, and the repercussions that could have on his work, and so effectively, on the patient. And Meredith knew to the very depth of her core that if anything happened, if any glitch occurred, no matter how how minor, no matter the reason, it would destroy Derek. Holding any life in your hands was a burden many shied away from, that they as surgeons had embraced, but holding in your hands the life of a friend was something else entirely.

Meredith shook her head to herself. He was already too altered by this, she didn't want to think what it would do to him if something happened. The Derek Shepherd currently preparing for surgery was not the arrogant, cock-sure, playful attitude Derek she knew. He was a nervous wreck, and she couldn't stand it. However tiring that other Derek could be, it was the man she had fallen in love with, and she couldn't bare to see that spirit in him so broken.
No, however much it hurt, however much it was painful to love him, she cared too much. She had to do something. Derek had accused her of giving up. Of refusing to fight. Well here she was; fighting.

FLASHBACK

Their fuming staring match on each side of Helen's bed continued for a few more minutes before Derek finally lost patience and interrupted the paralysed silence, roughly ordering her in the hall for a private word. And so, at his cold formal address of "Dr. Grey", she had followed him out, leaving a slightly shivering Helen behind.

But Derek wasn't really focused on that at that stage. All his pent up anger against her of the morning, multiplied ten-fold by the stress and worry of his friend's affliction, was currently focused on Meredith. And indeed, barely had she clicked the door of the patient room shut behind them, then Derek had already wheeled on her fiercely.

"Where the hell do you get off challenging me in front of a patient?" he yelled, "MY patient" he further insisted, so ferociously that the sturdiest of individuals would have cowered down before him.
But Meredith was just as strongheaded as he was, and quite used to by now, because of her slightly rebellious nature, being yelled at by the many different authority figures of the U.S. army, all of which were much more frightening than Derek Shepherd. So, she held her ground, answering him in just as firm a tone, if slightly more composed. She was NOT backing down on this.

"Someone had to. You were completely overstepping the line of your rights and ignoring the basis of patient care. Someone had to stand up for her!" she replied angrily, furious in her own right that she was getting told off for doing the right thing.

"Overstepping the line? You're the one who's overstepping the damn line! How dare you? She's my patient! Who I'm trying to save. As for you, you have no need to 'stand up" for her as you say, she's none of your concern."

Meredith wanted to say that even if that had been the case, and she hadn't felt compelled for Helen's sake to become implicated, she would still be concerned for him, but didn't. She had already denied him, and herself, the truth of those feelings, no matter that she'd been lying, and now wasn't really the time for that...
Instead she answered his words with a biting reply of her own.

"She became my concern when her doctor completely ignored her wishes. She has a right to make her own way without you guiltripping her into doing as you damn well please."

Derek was trembling when he next spoke, his voice broken in agony-filled rage.

"I'm not going to let anyone else give up on me. Just because you're too coward to give this a chance, it doesn't mean I'm going to let anyone else go. You made your choice clear this morning, and Helen's made hers. She agreed to the surgery, that's all that matters."

At this Meredith stumbled back slightly, taken aback by his brusque return to the morning's argument., but recovered eventually.

"She didn't make that choice. You made it for her."

Her tone was nowhere near as bitter at that morning, her voice quiet when she added, "and please don't make this about us, this isn't about us." She was almost pleading, regretful. She hated to see him in so much pain...

"No, you're right, Dr. Grey", he said the name spitefully, "you've made it abundantly clear there is no us."

She felt his words tear at her insides as he spoke them, as if, in spite of her insistance to the contrary over the last eighteen days, the knowledge that he was finally giving up on them was enough to truly break her.

Despite that she'd repeatedly spurned him, Meredith realised that deep down, she had shared his hopes, and wished to be with him. As if it had taken him to finally give up to acknowledge the strength of her own desires. But his finally letting go made them impossible. At the present moreover, there were other concerns to deal with. And indeed, unheeding of the acute pain now etched in her expression, Derek continued on the previous subject

"This is about me trying to save my friend's life. Which you're getting in the way of."

"If you're so hell-bent on her having the operation, Derek, then at least let someone else scrub in. You're in no condition to do so yourself."

Meredith's tone was calm and compassionate when she finally answered with this proposition, still recovering from the blow of his cutting words to her about them. She knew, that as fixed as he was on seeing Helen get better, he would not give up the surgery. But if she could limit the damage, avoid him that crushing pressure, she would.
But if possible, Derek's countenance became even more hostile to her at these words, his tone threateningly low and cold.
"No way in hell am I trusting her to anyone else. She's my patient and I'm seeing to her surgery."

Meredith shook her head.

"Derek," she once more addressed him by his first name, trying desperately to reason with him, "you're too attached to this case, if something were to go wrong..."

But Derek interrupted her.

"Nothing will go wrong. I'm the best there is. I can and will do this surgery. How dare you question my judgment? I'm your boss. I could report you to the chief for this. Undermining me in front of her and again now...I am NOT too attached. I am merely trying to take care of my patient. And as such, I am ordering you to stay the hell away from her. As you've so graciously pointed out, this is a difficult surgery, and I don't need your negativity affecting her before we put her under."

He looked directly into her eyes as he said this, the usual comforting glow replaced by blistering animosity, so that it hurt to keep his gaze.

"I don't want you in her room, I don't want you around her room or even in this hallway, I don't want you in the O.R. If I so much as see you in the gallery, I'm writing you up to Richard. You're not even on neuro today, so you have nothing to do with this case."

His ice-cold voice hammered in her mind.

"I'm not letting you jeopardise me trying to save someone I care very much about. I'm trying not to lose someone else,"he said this looking pointedly at her, accusingly, before finishing, "which, as you're preventing me from it, is something you obviously know nothing about, so shut the hell up about it and get out of my sight."END OF FLASHBACK

And so, Meredith had left him, wallowing in his anger, shaking her head at his stubbornness as well as reeling in the double impact of his words on her, and the memories they surged up from her past.

Derek had been wrong about one thing.

Well several in fact, she mused, thinking about the feelings she was still attempting to deny within her. But he had been wrong about something else as well; in his anger-made assessment that because she was fighting him on this , it meant she didn't understand, that she didn't know what it was like to fight for a friend's life, that she had no idea what the hell she was talking about. He had been wrong, because Meredith knew exactly what he was going through, possibly better than anyone outside of her platoon could realise.

She knew exactly what it was to have a friend's life weighing over your head, and it was precisely for that reason that she was fighting Derek on this. Attempting to protect him from doing something that she was still convinced was a mistake.

FLASHBACK

Adrenaline coursed through Meredith's blood, not letting her focus on the fatigue or compacted grime crippling her aching body, drenched in sweat. Unstoppable tears were rushing past her eyelids as she called the order again "Charge to 300!"

The medical officer next to her reluctantly followed the order, but it was no use. They all knew it was too late. Even Meredith.

"Damn it Parker!" she cried out, her fists clenched as she injected another milligram dose of medication in a vain attempt to get his stats up "you can't do this! You don't get to die on me!"

It had been an ambush, a stupid ambush. Colonel Danforth's platoon had headed out onto the field that day, Corporal Henry Parker at the head of his squadron line, inevitably receiving the first and the worst of the incoming fire. Multiple GSW's, one near his heart. It had almost been too late from the battlefield itself, but his platoon had managed to bring him back in the off-chance that something could be done. But really it had already been over by the time they had gotten back.

Meredith had spent the entire day running around the trauma care tent, rushing from case to case, exhausted with stress and pressure. To diagnose, patch up, and save. But when she had recognised the last of the blood drenched bodies layed out before her, she had felt nauseous. It had been too late before she had started, and deep down, Meredith had known as much, but she wasn't letting go on this one.

To everyone around misogynistic, on the surface shallow and callous. But she'd gotten past the defensive appearances he hid behind; the walls, that just like herself he'd protected himself with. In a lot of ways, he reminded her of Alex.

So, she refused to give up until she could truthfully say that she had done everything she could. That was one thing her civilian training had made damn straight in her mind before her transfer here. You didn't give up until it was over. And she wasn't about to ignore a lesson Miranda Bailey had taught her, especially for the sake of a friend. He was one of them. They all were. But this one, this one was a friend. Sure he was annoying, and could usually suffer from being pulled down a notch or too, but he was a good guy. He had a wife. Two adorable eleven month old twins that made him lose his hard-ass exterior when he mentioned them, his eyes lighting up in cheesy wonderment at how much he loved them."Damn it Parker! Come back!"

She looked around her in horror as the realisation hit her that the rest of the operating team were standing back.

"No! You can't give up, you can't..."

She was startled by the gentle but firm hand of Colonel Rivers on her shoulder, as he repeated the order given seconds previously, that she stand down, like the rest of her colleagues.

"No, we can't give up...Parker, he...I..."

"Stand down, G." he ordered calmly, compassion and yet determination seeping through "it's over."

She turned to her commanding officer in utter despair.

"No! We can't give up. I'm a doctor, I'm;.. I'm supposed to save lives...I"

Michael shook his head, his voice a bit firmer. "That's an order G. stand Down."

His grip tightened on her shoulder as she started shaking in near hyperventilation.
Shaking his head at her he sighed deeply.

"You can't save everyone G, sometimes you just have to let go."

END OF FLASHBACK

Meredith's heart clenched at the memory. How the guilt and feeling of utter uselessness had crushed her.
She remembered how she had cringed at the realisation of the inexorable waste. The total waste of life that came from war, the sickening, overpowering prevail of death everytime. If it wasn't at one moment it was later, but in the end, the death always prevailed.
It was then that she had been confronted with the real pressure of her mission. After that, she had no longer simply been Meredith Grey running away from her broken life. She had felt from that moment on the specific weight of the responsibility she had undertaken in joining the army, and indeed, in reciting her Hippocratic oath upon becoming a doctor.

But at the same time, she had been faced with the uncertainty of it all. The backlash of the responsibility she was signing up for, that however hard you tried, however efficient you were, you didn't always win. In fact, there were times, when you felt like crumbling under the impression that the losses far outweighed the victories, and that all this wasn't worth it.
You never got used to the death.

It had been a lesson she hadn't completely assimilated in the civilian world, the loss of patients, and out here, in the middle of a war, it was a much harder, crueller lesson to learn. Back here, you had to come to terms with the fact that you couldn't save everyone. All the patients you attended to, the children, the annoying grouchy old men and the brainless college cheerleaders, all the patients you got to know over the course of a day or two, or sometimes weeks for the big cases, you couldn't save all of them.

But in the army, it was different. The people you treated weren't strangers. They were your people. There was a always a big chance that you knew the person you were cutting into. Not always, because there were several platoons, and they didn't always interact very much, but most of the time, you were conscious that the stretcher being brought in from afar as you ran around the trauma tent, could very well be carrying one of your friends in it. There was always that risk. That you'd have to take a friend's life in your hands. Step up as a doctor and forget that this was the same guy who'd beat you at poker the day before. Forget that this was a guy who, for months at a time, had played a part in your life. Forget that the person on the table, and sometimes in the bodybag afterwards, was or had been somebody to you.

That was why Meredith couldn't watch Derek crumble under the guilt if something happened to Helen. Because she knew what it did to you. And however much she hated to fight him on this, she would do anything to spare him that pain.

You were told when you became a doctor that you wouldn't save everyone. The gap between the words and the realisation of the reality was bad enough. In the army, the toll it took on you was even bigger. Amongst the rockets and the grenades, you came to learn that under the constant threat of fire, you could lose anyone.

Meredith knew what it was to lose someone you'd worked with, cared about, built a friendship with.
So no matter Derek's orders and threats to her, Meredith knew she had to do something.
She wouldn't go to the chief. If she was honest with herself, she didn't want him involved in this . And there was the fact she knew that it wouldn't help matters in any way. It could only really make things worse. Derek would see it as a direct attempt to undermine his authority, as a well as a staggering display on her part, of taking advantage of whatever relationship she might have with Richard. So no, she wouldn't bring this to the chief.

She'd have gone to Bailey, but she thought that in this case, even her lecturing wouldn't have gotten through to him.

There was only one person Meredith could possibly think of that had any chance of getting the message through. And he owed Derek, that was undeniable. Come to think of it, he owed her too.
She looked at the clock again. 4:15 A.M.

She still had to finish this, she decided, and really, it was still too early to page him. But knowing him, he probably wasn't sleeping. She'd be prepared to bet her life he had spent the night...otherwise engaged. She shook her head in mixed amusement and exasperation at the thought. She supposed she could give him another hour before paging him, while she finished all the other things she had to do.

But then, it was show-time.

AN 28/06/12

Okay people,

no doubt some of you have noticed that i haven't updated in a while. The reason is simply that my cousin thought it would be a good idea to spill her cofee on my usb stick. Thankfully there weren't too many chapters on there, but it might take some time to get through. My other story got held back as well unfortunately, and it (RotP) gets priority in rewriting simply because its the one i havent updated on in the longest.

As for the haters on WiL that are saying i quit war is love coz i couldn't take the heat, they can piss off. When you don't know what the hell ur talking about, plz shut up. There is no way i would let a couple of discontented critics scare me off. I've already said i appreciate criticism, and i stand by that. When its contructive it helps polish and improve writing. What i do not appreciate is constant unbalanced repeated dissing on the same points over and over. I've already said this a million times, if you don't like my fic, don't read it. I happen to think my derek is on par with the one in the show, and enough people agreed with me that i know i can keep writing him that way. For those of you who remember the Helen Crawford episode from the show, Derek behaved exactly like he did in my fic, except that on GA no one called him on it.

For those of you who are waiting faithfully, I'm coming home today, i'll be trying to update both stories as soon as possible.

The next update on WiL is a Mark/Mer face-off, its called "Consorting with the enemy"

cheers,

ano