This was originally two seperate updates...a very small one and a very large one...I will put dash marks where they are seperate.

A single drop of sweat trails down her cheek, tickling the skin with its slow progression. She doesn't reach up and wipe it away. She can't. She is too busy trying to make the room stop spinning. Spinning and blurring into a prism of bright colors and shapes. Shapes with fuzzy outlines. A room full of Shepherds. Shepherds with fuzzy outlines.

She feels the bile rising up her esophagus once again. She just can't seem to catch a break. She turns to her side and pushes Derek out of the way before dry heaving over the rail of the bed. Salty tears run down her cheeks. Tears from the pain. Tears from the fear.

Derek's hand rubs up and down her back, his heart aching at seeing her in so much pain. How he wishes that they could go back to the ship. How they could create their own little cocoon and hide from the world as he tries to sooth her pain. Just like he did with the cramps. But this isn't cramps. This is so much more. This is everything.

He leans down and presses his dry lips against the moist skin of her temple. This is the first time those lips have touched her skin in so long. Too long. The desert surfaces of his lips become moist with the salty taste of her sweat and tears.

Meredith. Meredith. Meredith.

He repeats over and over in his head. Like a mantra. Like a prayer. Like any moment he is afraid that she will disappear. That he will open his eyes and she will be gone. Just like on the ship. He can't lose her again. He can't lose them. But most of all, he can't lose her.

The tears sting his eyes, threatening to fall at any minute. But they can't. They can't fall. He has to be strong. He needs to be strong. For them. He needs to be strong for them. His young family. His new family. His family. "Mom," he manages in a broken voice. Broken because he is slowly falling apart. His voice begs. His voice pleads.

His voice pains his mother. His mother who hates to see her baby boy in pain. And she has never seen him in this much pain. Never. Not even after his motorcycle accident. Not even after he caught Addison cheating. The closest he has ever come to this type of pain was when he returned from the cruise. Pain. She needs to sooth her baby's pain.

Derek feels the dainty hand of his mother on his shoulder and it takes everything he has to not break down. It takes everything he has to not turn around and let his mother hold him as he sobs like a little baby. He sobs like a little baby for his little baby. For his little baby and the love of his life. Thirty minutes ago he wouldn't have know the difference. Thirty minutes ago he didn't know that his son existed. Thirty minutes ago he didn't know where Meredith was. Thirty minutes ago there was a gaping hole in his heart.

Meredith finally falls back on the bed. Her head hurts. Her entire body hurts. Her heart hurts. She can feel Derek lace his fingers through her, giving her a certain strength that she didn't possess previously. Her world is spinning and he has become the one point of focus. She feels light. She feels light and floaty and dizzy. Her eyelids flutter as she struggles to remain conscious. She hears a monitor beeping in the background. Something is wrong. Something is definitely wrong. She knows that something is wrong as the blackness surrounds her and she sinks into unconsciousness as the scales begin to tip.

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Derek watches Meredith's eyes roll back in her head as her eyelids flutter lightly. He shakes her shoulder slightly, hoping to keep her awake and that is when it happens. The scariest noise he could ever hear. The beeping of a monitor. The beeping of the monitor that is registering the heart rate of the baby. The baby is in distress. The baby is in distress and Meredith just passed out. It is too much. It is all too much.

"Meredith?" he asks in a panicked voice. "Meredith?! Please wake up. Please, oh God, please wake up!!" he practically screams. He feels his mother's hand on his elbow.

"Derek," she whispers, "you need to leave," she says in a tear-filled voice.

Derek turns to face his mother, a shocked expression on his face. "What? I can't leave. I can't leave her. I can't leave them. I can't leave them all alone. I can't. You can't. I can't," he says quickly, bordering on panic.

Mrs. Shepherd turns to the nurse in the room. "Go make sure the OR is open. We will be up in a minute," she says before turning back to her son. "We need to take her now, Derek. The baby is in distress because of the tear and Meredith is bleeding too much. You and your father can come with us to the elevator, but then you need to stay in the waiting room," she says as a single tear trails down her cheek. A tear because of the fact that her son is cracking in front of her.

He silently nods before turning back to Meredith. He grabs her limp hands and brings it to his lips. "It's going to be okay, Mer. My mom is going to take care of you. She is going to take great care of you and our son. You are both going to be okay and then we can finally be together. We can be a family. I want to take care of you," he says as the tears gather in his eyes, blurring his vision. He leans down close to her ear, smoothing her hair back out of her pale face. "I love you," he whispers, "I have always loved you. From the moment you ran into me I have loved you. I will never stop. I will never stop loving you, so please, Mer, please don't leave me. I can't lose you again. Please. You have to fight. You have to fight for you. You have to fight for our son. You have to fight for us," he says as they reach the elevator.

He didn't even realize that they were moving. He was so focused on her that he didn't notice they were at the elevator until his mother's hand was on his back again. "Der, dear," she starts.

He throws his hands up in the air. "I know! I know! God, do I know!" he practically yells. He leans down and kisses Meredith on the forehead. "I love you. I love you so damn much," he says softly before moving his mouth down to her stomach. He raises her hospital gown slightly to reveal her swollen abdomen. His lips graze her flesh. "Pull through, little man. You can do it. Be strong. Be strong for mommy and daddy. I love you," he says as a single tear falls onto Meredith soft flesh.

He feels her moving away. He can feel them pushing the bed. He can feel her slipping out of his grip.

"I will take good care of her," his mother whispers into his ear before stepping onto the elevator with Meredith.

He simply nods. He can't do much else. He watches the doors begin to close. They are closing on his future. So much is in that elevator. So much. He can't lose them. He can't lose her. He just can't. He feels a heavy hand on his shoulder. He knows that hand.

"Come on, son. Let's go to the waiting room," his father says with a heavy voice. He too hates to see his son in this much pain.

However, Derek doesn't turn and follow his father. He turns and walks in the opposite direction. There is something that he needs to do. There is something that he needs to get.

He walks to the nearby stairwell door and goes down the numerous flights two steps at a time. After what seems like forever, he finally reaches the bottom floor. He walks out into the lobby and into the gift shop. He moves towards the back of the shop. The area where they have the baby clothes. He sees it. He sees what he came after. He grabs one of them and walks towards the front of the store, but something catches his eye and causes him to stop. He smiles at the memory. The day that they spent together reading cosmo and eating every kind of junk food possible.

He reaches forward and grabs the cosmo before grabbing a handful of chocolate. The lady behind the register smiles at him. "Another nephew, Dr. Shepherd?" she asks in a flirty voice while batting her eyelashes at him.

Derek clears his throat. "Umm..no..actually. My, um, my son," he mumbles. Saying it for the first time to someone other than family. It felt so food. It feels so good. Son. He is having a son. They will be okay. They have to be okay.

The girl flushes. "Oh, I didn't know you were…I had no idea…congratulations, doctor," she says in a nervous voice.

Derek runs his hand through his hair. "She's in surgery. The baby isn't due for five more months, I just needed…." Derek trails off.

The girl smiles warmly at him. "You just needed something to hold on to," she says in a soft voice.

Derek smiles sadly at her. "Yeah," he sighs as she tells him the total. He quickly pays her before walking out of the gift shop. He needs to get back to her floor. He needs to be closer to them. To her.

He takes the stairs two at a time, the various items bouncing about in the bag. His breathing is ragged by the time he reaches the floor and a drop of sweat trails down his temple. He walks into the waiting room and sees his father sitting down. He walks over to him and plops down into the chair next to him, the weight on his shoulders bringing him down quickly.

His father turns and looks at him as he pulls the onesie out of the bag. He runs his forefinger over the large NY in the middle of the white pinstriped garment.

"Already grooming him to be a Yankees fan, eh?" his father asks as he tries to lighten the moment. However, his words seem to be the final straw to break the camel's back.

Derek tightens his grip on the onesie as his shoulders begin to shake with suppressed sobs. His father sees him breaking. He sees his own boy breaking and immediately wraps his strong arms around Derek's trembling shoulders.

His father's gentle touch sends him spiraling. He falls forward out of the chair and onto his hands and knees. Its too much. Its all too much. Holding the onesie. Thinking about his son wearing it. Thinking about playing catch and taking him to Yankee's games. Then thinking about the possibility of all of that being taken away.

His right hand clings desperately to the onesie as the sobs bubble up from the depths of his stomach. His father is immediately at his side, holding him in his arms. Derek clings to his father. He clings to his father like he is six years old and has just scraped his knee. He clings to his father like he needs his father to save him.

His tears bleed through his fathers sweater. So many tears. His chest hurts. He feels so much pain. Emotional pain that is manifesting into a physical tightening of his chest. He gasps for air as he tries to grasp at hope. Hope that everything will be okay. He needs everything to be okay.

His father runs his hand up and down his son's trembling back as the his own tears run freely down his cheeks. His son is clinging to him as he is breaking and he can't stand to see that. His son is strong. His son is so strong. He must really love Meredith. She must really be the one for him to be feeling this much pain.

He doesn't try to speak. He doesn't try to offer him any condolences. What can he say? He can offer empty words of comfort that will only increase Derek's pain. Or he can hold him. He can hold him and let him know that he's not alone.

The time crawls along as father continues to embrace a broken son. His embrace is the only thing that is keeping Derek from falling completely apart. Derek can't believe that he was given everything everything, only to have it threatened to be taken away moments later. He imagines that their son will have his hair and eyes, Meredith's nose and stubborn chin. He will probably teach him his McDreamy smile as Meredith called it on their cruise. He will teach him how to play catch. He will help him with his math homework and talk to him about girls. He will sit in front of the television on Saturday mornings in his underwear while they watch cartoons and eat cereal that has tons of sugar. He will teach him how to ride his bike. He will scare the monsters away from his closet. He will wake up some morning to him crawling into bed with him and Meredith.

Meredith.

He remembers first bumping into her outside of his room. He was dreading the trip. He only agreed to come because of Mark and then he met Meredith. He felt the spark right away. A spark that ignited a flame deep within him. He remembers that first kiss. He claimed that he was saving her from that creepy old man, but he was truly saving himself. She saved him. She saved by giving him the chance to fall so completely in love that there was no way in hell he could fall out. He remembers waking up on their last morning together only to find himself alone. Alone with a single sheet of paper and the copy of the Cosmopolitan that was left on her lavender scented pillow.

It was when they spent that day together, when she was cramping so bad, that day he realized that he was falling in love with her. He knew that he was falling and that no matter how hard it hurt when the fall was complete, he didn't want to stop. She must have felt it to. Her leaving the Cosmo showed that she felt it too.

He can't lose her. He can't lose her again. She is his Elizabeth. She made him watch "Pride and Prejudice" numerous times on the ship. She is his Elizabeth and she has captivated him body and soul. He loves her. He loves her so much that he no longer exists. He no longer exists because he is now composed of them and she has such a large part of him.

Nothing can happen to her. Please, God, don't let anything happen to her. Derek doesn't even know if he believes in God, but he prays. He prays for the first time in about twenty years. He prays because nothing has ever been this important to him. Nothing has ever been this important to him and he has absolutely no control over the situation. He is helpless.

Finally, finally after what seems like forever but in reality is only an hour, the now silent tears stop flowing. He is empty. His tear ducts are drained. He is emotionally drained and exhausted after an hour. An hour of barely remembering to breathe. Of feeling completely alone and powerless. An hour that seems like an eternity.

He wipes his tear-stained cheeks with the back of his hand before leaning out of his father's embrace. He doesn't care that his ass is asleep from sitting on the hard floor for an hour. He doesn't care that everyone in the waiting room is looking at him with sympathetic eyes. None of them know his pain. None of them know his fear. None of them know that his entire future is hanging by a delicate thread. They don't know. But Derek knows. He knows all too well.

He inhales deeply, his body involuntarily shuddering as he does so, before pushing himself up off of the floor. He bends down and helps his father to his feet, the onesie still grasped in his hand. Once his father is on his feet, he pulls Derek into a tight hug.

"I wish I could say something son. I wish like hell I could ease your pain, even if it was only a little bit. But I know I can't. I know nothing that I can say will make you feel better, and that, Derek, that is what is going to make you one hell of a father. You have made me proud many times, but I have never been prouder of you than I am now," he says in a tear-filled voice. "I love you, son." He pats Derek on the back before releasing him from the hug.

Derek smiles sadly at his dad, saying thank you in that small gesture, before throwing himself into the nearest seat. He leans forward, placing his elbows on his knees as he begins to run his fingers over the lines of the tiny onesie once again.

"I only just found out that he existed," Derek says in a broken voice, " but I already want to protect him from everything. I…I already have so many…hopes….so many dream….for him…I…and Meredith…" Derek says while turning to his father, "she is…something…everything. What are the chances?" Derek laughs somewhat bitterly, the irony eating him alive. "What are the chances that my Meredith…my amazing, wonderful, beautiful Meredith, what are the chances that she would be your Meredith?" Derek says before allowing his face to fall back in his hands.

His father places his hand on his back as he leans in closer to him. "I would say damn near impossible. The fact that it did happen, Derek, the fact that you two were brought together in a world of over six billion people, that fact says that it's fate. You two are fated."

Derek laughs bitterly. "What a cruel joke of fate. Give her back to me only to have her life and that of my son's threatened. Pretty damn cruel."

His father accidentally kicks the bag from the gift shop over, spilling its contents onto the floor. "Cosmo?" he asks in a perplexed tone.

A smile crosses Derek's face, the first smile in what seems like ages. "Yeah," Derek sighs almost happily. He turns to face his confused father. "Mer was sick one day, so I brought her a Cosmo and a bunch of junk food to make her feel better. We spent two whole days together. Talking, laughing, watching movies. Just getting to know each other. It was during those two days that I realized that I was falling in love with her," Derek finishes, his eyes somewhat brighter as he recounts the memory to his father. He runs his hand over his face. "The morning I woke up and she was gone, she left a Cosmo on the bedside table. I think it was her way of telling me that she fell for me too," he finishes, the sadness seeping back into his voice.

Derek can't help but feel that he is clinging to the happy moments shared with Meredith. He needs to. He needs to remember the good times they were together, instead of the hell he lived in while they were apart. He needs to have faith. Faith that she will be okay. He knows that she is strong. Faith. He is trying so damn hard to have some faith.

The two men fall into a silence as the each contemplate the situation and its repercussions. Dr. Shepherd knows about Meredith's hard life. He knows that it will break his son even more. He also knows that they need to do something to alleviate that. Meredith is part of their family now and Shepherds take care of Shepherds.

Just as he opens his mouth to speak, a familiar figure appears in the doorway to the waiting room. It's his wife. He nudges Derek in the ribs with his elbow to get his attention.

Derek's head immediately jerks up at the sharp pain in his side and sees his mother. He is on his feet and walking towards her before he is even able to register her early arrival. It has only been two hours. Two very long hours, but the surgery, the surgery usually lasts at least two hours. Two hours isn't long enough. Not to prep her and then do the surgery. Two hours is no where near enough. And the look on his mother's face. The look on his mother's face is scaring the hell out of him.

"Derek," his mother sighs, "you should probably sit down," she says as she places a hand on his shoulder.

"NO!" he shouts as he feels his world beginning to dissipate into tiny particles and float away.

"Derek," his mother tries again in a slightly louder voice.

Derek feels the sobs beginning to bubble to the surface once again as he brings the hand clinging to the Yankees' onesie to his heart. "No, no, no, no, no. Don't tell me. Please, please, please don't tell me. I…I was going to take him to a Yankees-Red Sox game. I…please…no…" he sobs into his hand.

"Derek!" his mother practically shouts at him as she grabs his face and forces him to look at her. "Listen to me," she says in a calm voice, "Meredith and the baby are fine. They made it through the surgery. They made it through but it is going to be rough. She lost a lot of blood and the baby was in severe distress. They are both critical at the moment, but they are both alive," she finishes with a tear-filled voice as she pulls her baby boy into her arms.

She holds Derek in her arms as he breaks down for the second time in two hours. This break down is unlike the first. He is sobbing in relief. He is sobbing because he is just so relieved. They are critical, but they are alive. He feels as if he will get his second chance. He will get his chance to have a son. He will get a chance to be a father. He will get a chance to love Meredith.

As Mrs. Shepherd holds her sobbing son in her arms, she can't bring herself to tell him the rest. She can't tell him that Meredith almost coded on the table. She can't tell him that although Meredith seems to be doing well at the moment, her chances are still only at seventy-five percent. She can't tell him that his son has an even smaller chance. Her grandson. She can't tell him that there is only a fifty percent chance for that tiny life. There is an even slimmer chance that he will not suffer some form of mental defect. She can't tell him because he is her son. He is her baby. He is her baby and she cannot watch him break anymore than he already has.

The balancing act is still very much in operation, only this time the scales are not equally weighed and the outcome seems to be even more uncertain.

I hope you guys like this chapter, because it took a while to write. I wasn't even planning on updating this fic yet, but I really wanted to. LOL. So I did. Derek is clinging in this chapter, to the onesie, to his dad, to his mom. He is clinging to hope. I also really wanted to show his feelings concerning Meredith because we haven't really seen that too much. Let me know what you think.

-Marci