A/N: Welcome back! This is one of the classic storylines I'm sure you all loved at the time, so I'm really happy I get to include this one here. Of course I made my own edits to it, so I hope you'll enjoy!

Chapter 15

The ER is a madhouse, and Meredith is loving every second of it. She woke up with a bad feeling in the pit of her stomach this morning, and there's nothing like a busy ER to keep her dread at bay.

They all are minor injuries, except Mr. Carson, the genius who decided to play war with his buddy and ended up shattering his spine when he was hit in the back with the ammunition of their homemade cannon.

Now there's a paramedic with her hand stuck in the hole in his back, as they wheel him to a trauma room.

People really are crazy, working in the ER is a daily reminder. Especially when she stares at Mr. Carson's wife, who hasn't stopped screaming bloody murder from the moment she has stepped foot in the hospital.

She needs the distraction, when Derek Shepherd is her intern for the day.

Part of her, the professional part of her, is glad she has him – the spine reconstruction looks complicated since she can barely see anything from the scans – and the guy has good instincts. She knows she can trust him not to royally screw up.

"Are you flying in blind?" Derek asks her while they're both studying Mr. Carson's scans, and she's grateful she's looking at them in the trauma bay and not in a secluded viewing room. She's not sure she can stand his presence when they are alone in a room and not feel the overwhelmingly urge to push him against a wall and have her way with him.

That crooked smile of his and those sparkling pre-surgery eyes will be the death of her.

"The chest x-rays are going to be a blur, we'll have to go fishing for the bone fragments."

"You know I love fishing." He smirks, whispering in her ear, and jeez, he's getting smooth at this. More confident for sure.

"Fine, you're scrubbing in."

They both walk beside the gurney, keeping smiles on their faces and talking about everything but the fact that the man has a hole in his back, the screaming of Mrs. Carson becoming a dull hum the more they near the OR.

Hannah, the paramedic, is freaked out enough as it is. She's plugging a hole with her hand on her second day on the job, she has a right to be slightly nervous. Meredith remembers the jitters of her first week as an intern, and she doesn't wish them on anyone. Except the new interns, who deserve to be tortured.

She stands in front of Mr. Carson's back, her movements still for a beat while she closes her eyes and lets her hand hover over her stomach for a second, gathering her wits, allowing the rest of the world to disappear. All her bad feelings and her confusions fall away as she focuses. She can feel Derek's eyes on her, but he doesn't speak until her ritual is over; he's one of the first interns to do so without the need of a glare.

"He's under," he says, finding his spot beside her.

On the other side of the operating table there's Dr. Bailey, the best resident in the program, ready to patch up the General portion of the surgery. Still, Meredith wonders how long it will take Ellis Grey to swoop in and replace Bailey in front of her, considering how high profile this case might turn out to be.

Hannah is cracking jokes and shaking slightly next to Bailey when they are ready to start the surgery.

Meredith can barely make the first incision to enlarge the opening where Hannah has her hand before the OR door cracks open and Ellis Grey appears. She's standing there, a mask over her mouth, her eyes filled with worry.

"Dr. Grey, I need to speak to you."

Meredith rolls her eyes. "You can jump right in, Dr. Grey." She shrugs, though the look in her mother's eyes is the one telling her not to mess with her.

"Please, step away from the table and talk to me." Yep, her tone of voice is definitely the one for serious conversations. Like when she dyed her hair pink, or she told her she was going to Europe for the summer with Sadie kind of serious.

She tries not to make sudden movements to scare off her surgical team as she gets closer to her mother.

"It's a code black, Meredith," she says, her face pale.

"Code what?"

"Black," she repeats, serious and resolute.

"Isn't that for the ER only? When they are at full capacity?"

"No, this is our own code black," Ellis says gravely. "Bomb in a body cavity."

Meredith feels her knees shaking. She had a point with her bad feeling. "B-Bomb?"

"Yes, the paramedic is holding the device steady. There's live, unexploded ammunition inside Mr. Carson's body. If the girl moves even of an inch, the whole place could blow up."

"Fuck." Meredith shakes her head in disbelief. "This is...fuck."

"You should evacuate."

Her eyes widen. Okay, yes, there's a bomb, but this is her patient. This is a paramedic as green as they come. She can't leave the girl alone holding a bomb just because they are scared.

"What? No. It's my patient. My OR."

"Meredith, the device is extremely unstable. We called the bomb squad, they're on their way. They told us to evacuate."

"Someone needs to stay here. Monitor the patient, and the paramedic. I'm staying. I'll have the rest of the team leave."

"Reckless," her mother says, shaking her head. "You're reckless and crazy."

"They need me. If I explode, so be it. Other people in this place have families waiting for them at home. Spouses and children and parents who want to see them come home. I'm okay right here."

"I want you to come home!" she hisses, and Meredith's eyes widen slightly. "Meredith I…"

"Mom, I'll be out of here soon. Don't think like that. I'll be okay."

Her mother doesn't look convinced one bit, but heaves out a sigh. "Fine. Stay. Just…"

"I'll be okay."

Meredith moves back near the table, near the bomb, watching as the whole OR is talking in hushed tones about the conversation she just had with the Chief of Surgery.

"Alright, we are in code black, people. For those of you who don't know, code black here means bomb. We're dealing with a bomb."

"Where?" One of the scrub nurses asks, the anesthesiologist already springing on his feet.

"Inside Mr. Carson." Meredith sighs, watching as Hannah turns white as a sheet and starts moving her hand. "NO!" Meredith shouts, grabbing her hand and keeping it steady. The girl is shaking. "You're keeping him from bleeding out and blowing up, Hannah. If you move, he dies and we all explode. Don't move." Meredith takes a deep breath, keeping her hand firmly over Hannah's. "Those of you who want to go, you are free to leave."

Right after she says that, a flurry of men in black Kevlar vests enter her OR, mingling with the shuffling of her OR team leaving the room. After the procession is over, there are only four people in the OR apart from the bomb squad: Hannah, Dr. Bailey, Dr. Shepherd and herself.

"Are you crazy?" She stares down Derek as they are brought to the side and given protective gear as well.

"What?"

"You have a son. You are his only parent." She almost wants to add a duh, but she doesn't. He clearly knows that, doesn't he?

"And we're not blowing up. The bomb squad is here. We'll be okay. I'll tell this to David and he'll brag about his daddy seeing a bomb for weeks to his school buddies."

"Der...Dr. Shepherd, this is not a joke. It's uncontrolled, homemade ammunition. Highly unstable, just like Mr. Carson and his buddy who made them."

He chuckles. The madman has the courage to chuckle. "We're still not dying. I have survived years of SPD, I won't die like this. And I hope God will have mercy for a single dad."

"You believe in God?"

"My mom believes more." He shrugs, as they both move back to the table.

Hannah looks terrified as they wrap her into the vest, her eyes wide and glassy.

"I can't do this," she whispers, her shoulders shaking. "I can't."

"You can," Meredith murmurs back, smiling gently, helping the bomb squad guy tape the flak vest over Hannah's boobs.

"No, no, no, no." Hannah shakes her head, tears streaming steadfastly down her cheeks.

The air shifts around the girl for a second and Meredith feels her heart sink down to her stomach. Hannah is removing her hand.

Meredith tries to keep the girl's hand steady on the device, but before she knows it, Hannah's fingers are slipping out of the wound, and the girl is escaping from the OR door.

"You damn fool." Dr. Bailey breathes out, shaking her head as she looks down at Meredith's hand, now buried inside Mr. Carson's back, taking the place of the paramedic.

Stupid bad feelings.

"I was trying not to blow us all up, Dr. Bailey." Meredith sighs, but the resident is still shaking her head.

Meredith turns her head to look at Derek, watching as his eyes are wide, fear gripping him as he stands on the other side of the table, his hands limp at his sides.

"What the hell happened, here?" The guy with the sharp eyes commanding the bomb squad snaps, and Meredith closes her eyes.

The bomb is strangely warm to the touch, after being buried inside Mr. Carson for so long. It's lukewarm and smooth, and she can almost wrap her whole hand around the largest part of its missile-like shape. She can feel the blood that Mr. Carson's body is pumping through him, and she's hyper-aware of everything happening in her own body. It's been awhile since she's been so in tune with herself. She hears her blood rush through her ears, her breathing – trying to keep it nice and even – her feet solidly planted on the ground.

"Dr. Grey." Derek sighs, though he shakes his head. "Meredith – "

"I know," she says, her turn to take a deep intake of breath. "Not the smartest move ever."

"Brave, though."

"Dr. Shepherd, you can leave."

"I'm not leaving you," he says, winning a poignant look from Bailey.

"Derek, think about David."

"I'm thinking about him. I can't tell him you saved us all from certain explosion and I was too coward to stand by you."

"This is not about bravery. You need to be smart about this."

"Shepherd's not the brightest crayon in the box, Grey." Bailey butts in, glaring at both of them.

"See? I'm staying." He smirks.

"You can go too, Dr. Bailey."

"I'm staying."

"What about little Tuck?"

Bailey smiles. "Derek is right, we're not blowing up."

"See, thank you, Dr. Bailey."

"What if we do?"

"We'll duck and hope for the best. Maybe it's a lame bomb." He shrugs winning an eye-roll from Bailey.

"I'll tell you what, I'll let you call me Miranda if we get out of here alive," she says with a smirk, then turns sharply towards Derek. "No, Shepherd, you're never calling me Miranda."

"Aww," he whines. "I could be dead in an hour."

"Or you could be on rectals for the next year."

She actually giggles at them, even though she's practically ready to poop her pants. Maybe it's good if they remain there.

"Talk about something else. Something funny."

"My son is pretty funny." Derek boasts, only winning a glare from Bailey.

She watches as the two of them keep squabbling in their corner of the room as Bailey keeps ventilating Mr. Carson manually to avoid the oxygen, and Derek prompts the conversation. She loves to hear these two argue about the most pointless themes. Everything beats thinking about the explosive device she's holding.

The bomb squad guy, Dylan, comes back, announcing that they can proceed with the extraction. She loves the calm that this guy exudes, he feels a lot like Derek, even if he's a completely different man. Less hair, brown eyes, a lot less sense of humor.

"You're going to do great," Derek murmurs quietly as he backs away from the body cavity.

She wraps her fingers around the bomb a little more firmly, willing her body not to shake.

"You can do it," he whispers again.

"Are you sure?"

"I'm sure," he says with a smile.

"Alright, wrap your hand on the nose cone," Dylan says, though she can barely hear him.

Her whole life flashes before her eyes, as cheesy as it sounds. There's still so much that she wants to do, so many things to accomplish and she's just...she has to make peace with it. With everything that happened and what never happened. She has to be at peace.

"Look, you guys, you can all go. I'll be okay. I'm...the house, I'm sure someone will need it. Tell my parents to sell it. Tell Maggie that I loved her and that…"

"Meredith, tell her yourself." Derek's voice is harsher than before, and he snaps her out of her trance. She blinks a couple of times, feeling the stress of her day wash over her. She's exhausted. She wants to leave, she doesn't want to be here.

"Derek – "

"Meredith, don't say it. Save it for later. You'll take out that bomb, they will dispose it, and we'll fish the bones out of Mr. Carson's spine. Just like how you planned."

"I'm scared," she confesses, feeling a tear run down her cheek. "I had a bad feeling when I woke up and now…"

"I know." He smiles, his whole face lightening up. "It will be over in a second," he murmurs, his voice velvety soft.

"Promise?" She gulps.

"I promise."

She gently lifts her hand and the bomb as the whole OR holds their breaths. She keeps her eyes on Derek, his blue eyes, his gentle smile. She can't tear her gaze away or she'll snap and flee like Hannah.

Except, she manages to place the bomb on Dylan's bulletproof gloves, and her whole body sags as soon as her fingertips leave the metal device.

She watches as Bailey and Derek spring into doctor mode, trying to fix Mr. Carson, while Dylan slowly walks away with the bomb.

Only when she hears the quiet rumble of a contained explosion her body restarts again and she takes her rightful place as the leading surgeon.

She has no idea how long the surgery lasts, because she's on autopilot. She searches and sutures and cauterizes until Mr. Carson's body is fixed, and she can safely say he will be fine.

The exhaustion hits her like a ton of bricks as soon as she puts down the needle.

"Good job, Miranda." She smiles at her resident, who smirks back.

"Meredith," she says with a nod, before moving to the scrub room.

A nurse comes in to wheel Mr. Carson to the ICU, and, as she watches the gurney disappear, she feels two strong arms wrap around her torso, holding her firmly.

Safe.

All the bad feelings and the crap melt away, as Derek's arms envelop her in a blanket of safety. Maybe hugs are a good relaxation method indeed.

"Man, that was scary," he whispers next to her ear.

She nods into his chest, unable to say anything more, only returning his hug. It feels intimate and a little too perfect, but her brain is in overdrive, she can't say anything more.

"Celebratory drinks later at Joe's? Bailey is in." His proposal is a murmur in her ear.

"Sure." She smiles softly, letting go of him. Part of her wants to kiss him again, but she knows she's not exactly one-hundred percent responsible of her actions right in this second.

She needs a nap before Joe's in two hours.

Derek disappears in the scrub room, and she joins him. They share a comfortable quiet, sneaking glances at one another from time to time, his smile soft and welcoming as she tries not to collapse. His arms around her again would surely be helpful in staying upright.

She goes to update Mrs. Carson right after she has dried her hands, Derek following suit, and she's really grateful the woman has stopped screaming like a banshee at this point.

The woman cries, thanking all three of them, but Meredith knows it's not only her merit. Each person in the OR is responsible for the good outcome, even Hannah. Yes, the paramedic might have fled, but she kept him alive until then, probably saved his life before anyone else. Surgery is a team effort, after all.

Mrs. Carson's hug feels a little awkward, but she's used to awkward hugs from grateful loved ones. What is unexpected is her mother, cornering her on her way to her office, arms wide open.

Before she can put two and two together, Ellis Grey is hugging her. And not a gentle hug, a squeezing, burrito hug like the ones Derek has perfected for David. It feels like a genuine hug, a good hug; Meredith has no idea what to think.

"I'm so glad you didn't die today," Ellis says, her voice barely above a whisper, completely different from her usual tone.

Yep, Meredith is pretty sure she's already in her office asleep as soon as these words come out of Ellis Grey's mouth.

A/N: I hope you liked this one as much as the ones coming before it! Also, sorry for the lack of David, I kinda missed him too here!

I'm leving for the US next Monday, so I won't be able to update until August comes and my schedule as an au pair will settle. I'm not abandoning any story I have on-going, I just need some time to regroup! Keep the faith, and thank you for sticking with me!