54. Chapter 54

AN: To those of you who aren't also reading HWA, and therefore missed my AN, I have had a trifecta of technological issues which affected my ability to write...but things seem to be working now...

Derek had a feeling.

He had spent the night and morning feeling...off. But he had shrugged it off as lingering effects of the neurotoxin he had been exposed to the previous day, and nothing more.

But now it was more.

No one else exposed to the toxic patient were feeling lasting effects. And Derek's sense of off-ness had grown into something more, something stronger. He had wondered if it was anxiety for his girlfriend's mother's heart surgery, but then Ellis's radio-ablation had been postponed due to the ferry crash.

And his feeling wasn't passing.

It had welled inside him when he had caught sight of Meredith's face, smiling out at him from her hospital badge... Her hospital badge that was firmly attached to her coat, which was not on her, but covering a patient being transported to an ambulance without her.

And then Derek had turned, and his heart had jumped into his throat. The tiny blond girl his girlfriend had been escorting to safety stood across the emergency site, alone and lost. Meredith wasn't anywhere near her, and he knew that she would never have left the small girl alone in the chaos.

And he definitely knew his girlfriend would never have left that patient unattended.

And now Derek was gripping tightly to the hand of the tiny blond girl, hoping she would lead him to Meredith. She had yet to speak a word, but he trusted she understood him. The way her eyes had darkened and her head had shaken in response to his question about Meredith's safety had made his heart clench. Something was very, very wrong.

She stopped suddenly, staring around with wide, searching eyes.

Derek took a breath and crouched beside her. "What? It's okay," he soothed, trying to calm the girl, while his mind was screaming for her to find Meredith. "Just think. Where is she? Which way did she go?"

She turned her head left and right as she searched for...something.

"Take all the time you need. You're doing great." He forced his voice to sound calm, knowing that if he scared the girl she may never lead him to Meredith.

After a long moment her glancing stopped and she nodded to herself.

"Good," Derek spoke, quickly following behind as she led him away from the chaos. By the time he caught up, she was standing along the edge of the pier, staring out at the water. And as much as he wanted to pull her away from the ledge, he knew something was wrong. He could practically feel what she was going to do next.

"Okay, use your words," he pleaded. "Where exactly is Meredith?"

She didn't speak, but instead brought one arm out in front of her, pointing out at the water.

Derek swallowed hard, not a doubt in his mind that Meredith was in the water. She was in the water, and she didn't swim.

Meredith was in the water.

Meredith didn't know how to swim.

Meredith was in the water.

Oh, God...

Leaving the little girl's side, he stepped to the very edge, staring down at the water below. "Meredith," he whispered. "Meredith!" It was stupid to yell if she was under the surface, and had his brain still been functioning rationally, he would have realized that. "Meredith!" He tried again.

He searched left and right, catching sight of a set of stairs leading down to a water level dock. "Stay here," he said to the little girl. "It'll...it'll be okay," he tried to comfort, wishing he could believe it.

Derek somehow managed to pull off his jacket as he ran to the stairs, taking them two and three at a time before he landed hard on the dock. "Meredith!" He screamed. "Mer-" He cut himself off as his diaphragm hitched painfully. She was in the water.

And in the next moment he was in the water too.

The icy cold world around him shocked him, reaching its frigid tentacles down to his very core. His eyes burned, and his fingers and toes immediately began to numb.

But Derek barely noticed. Just like he didn't notice that he had probably ruined his pager, cell phone and blackberry. And his new shoes.

All his mind was able to compute was that Meredith was in the water and he didn't know where. It consumed him, and somewhere in the back of his mind, he knew that if he didn't find her, he may very well die trying.

Derek dove, searching downwards and swimming serpentines, back and forth, as far as he could before he had to come up for air. The world below the surface was cold and alien; darkness prevailed, only allowing him very limited sight.

And then he dove again.

And dove again.

And again.

He gasped for air on his fifth return to the surface, his chest hitching and sputtering as he sucked in oxygen he had denied his lungs for too long. His dives were getting longer and longer, and his body was beginning to surrender to the cold.

"Meredith..." He sputtered between gasps for breath. "Mer..." He had to find her soon. He had to. She was... He just had to find her. His dives were getting him further and further away from the dock, and he wondered absently just how deep she could be. He was going as far down as his arms and legs would take him, until his ears were popping and his eyes were burning with the salt content of the water.

With a deep breath, he dove again, and only half-way to his expected depth he slammed into something solid. His arms were around her before his brain fully processed that he had found her. The visual distance in the water was even less than he had thought; he hadn't even seen her form in front of him.

Still, he had found her. It was a miracle.

But it wasn't a happy moment. His rescue wouldn't be akin to a romantic movie. He wouldn't press his lips against hers under the water, breathing his air and life into her, and have her eyes flutter open when she surfaced.

With one arm firmly around her, he kicked and pulled his way upwards. Her extra weight pulled down on him, as if the deep, cold, alien world of Elliot Bay was claiming her, refusing to let her go.

But Derek would never let her go. He would never stop fighting for her.

His lungs were burning like never before as he fought upwards, and right before he surfaced his autonomic system kicked him, forcing his lungs to take a breath. The cold water burned as it flowed greedily into his lungs.

And then he surfaced, and oxygen finally found its way in, filling his lungs and duelling with the water in its way.

Without even a moment to breathe or cough he swam for the dock, and when he reached it he pushed his girlfriend's limp body up first, before pulling himself onto the solid wood beside her with straining muscles.

"Meredith," he whispered, his hands reaching out for the sides of her face, as if he had any heat to offer her. "Meredith!" But it was no use. She was cold and limp and unresponsive. And oh, so blue.

"Oh, God...Mer..." He murmured, reaching shaking fingers to her neck, feeling in vain for a pulse. He knew he wasn't going to find one. Just the time he had spent in the water was enough for someone to drown if they were unable to surface, and who knew how long she had been under. But it was still enough of a shock to bring tears to his eyes.

She was cold and blue and limp. And had no pulse, which meant blood wasn't flowing through her body. Which meant oxygen wasn't getting to her brain, or her...anything. It meant nothing in her body was getting the nourishment it needed. It meant her heart wasn't beating. It meant she was...

Dead.

She was dead.

His girlfriend. The love of his life. The women he was supposed to marry and spend the rest of his life with...was dead.

Derek only allowed himself a moment to wallow before he scooped her limp body into his arms and hurried up the stairs. He needed to get her to an ambulance, and then to the hospital. Soon. Right now.

He would save her.

He had to save her.

He couldn't lose her. Not now. Not like this. He had seen too much unexpected loss, had experienced it first hand. He needed her.

He had promised her forever, and forever couldn't already be over. He needed at least another fifty years with the woman who had taken his breath away the first time he had laid eyes on her. He needed to experience more things with her. They had a list. There were more things they needed to do. So many more.

He was supposed to take her to New York to meet his family, to show her that the idea of family really existed.

They were supposed to move out after her internship, and one day build a house.

He had a ring hidden in his office, perfect and ready and waiting for the right time.

He wanted to celebrate with her when her internship was over. To watch her perform her first solo surgery in the next year. To watch her become a better surgeon than himself.

He wanted to see her face on their wedding day, wanted to see the hope and love and confidence that had slowly developed over the last eleven months.

He wanted to spend the rest of his life with her. Eleven months wasn't enough.

000

Derek hadn't thought twice about the number of patients he was jumping ahead of when he had rushed Meredith to the nearest waiting ambulance and ordered the paramedic to get them to Grace. The drive was a blur as he had performed CPR like never before. It was something he was exposed to everyday, but had never felt as formidable as it did now.

Never had he pressed his lips to hers to have them not respond.

Never had he touched her skin and not felt warmed by the contact.

Never had he seen her so off colour.

Never had he pressed his hands to her so strongly. He could feel her ribs giving under his hands as his compressions grew stronger. It made tears spring to his eyes, but he couldn't stop. It was necessary. It was proper procedure. It was her best chance.

It was her only chance.

He barely noticed when the ambulance arrived at the hospital and came to a stop. He barely processed Miranda Bailey's shocked face as she stared she ushered him into the hospital. He barely noticed the hospital staff around him, hooking Meredith up to every trauma machine and monitor in the room.

All he paid attention to was Meredith. He didn't need the monitor to tell him her heart wasn't beating; he could feel the silence in her chest with every compression. And he didn't need a machine to tell him her temperature was too low; coldness was overtaking his heart from the lack of warmth in her body.

"She's alive," he whispered to himself, over and over and over. Maybe if he said it enough times it would come true. "She's alive. She's alive. She's alive."

"What the hell happened?" Richard's voice boomed as he stepped into the trauma room.

With his eyes glued on Meredith's face, searching for any signs of life, Derek spouted off some medical information, some a little more...hopeful than truthful.

"Shepherd, you need to get out."

Derek shook his head, tears pooling in his eyes as he continued to search for life in the frozen expression of his girlfriend.

Richard sighed heavily, bumping Derek's shoulder with his own as he pressed the neurosurgeon out of the way, taking over the compressions. "You can't do this. We need to do this."

Derek's now free hands found Meredith's face, cupping her cheeks and running through her wet hair. "I can't..."

"Derek," Richard spoke softly, pulling Derek's gaze away from Meredith for the first time. He and Richard had butted heads on many things regarding the dying woman before them in the past year, but a look of understanding passed between them. Richard needed Meredith to live too. Not as much as Derek – something they both knew and accepted – but he still did. "You need to get out of the way so we can do this."

"I can't," he repeated. "I can't leave her. I...I promised. I need to be here."

"No, you don't. You know that I can't let you stay. Don't make me have you dragged out."

Tears overflowed his lower lids. He couldn't leave. He couldn't leave her alone like this.

This couldn't be the last time he saw her with an ounce of hope that she would be okay.

"Derek," Richard promised.

He nodded absently and took a deep breath before ducking his head down to press his lips against Meredith's cold forehead. "I love you so much," he whispered fiercely, leaning his forehead against hers for a long moment, reminding himself than she was in good hands, the best he could hope for in this impossible situation. They would do everything possible for her.

His forehead still pressed against hers, he shut his eyes tightly and took a deep, ragged breath, willing warmth and strength and love to pass between them.

And then he opened his eyes and pulled himself away. He couldn't let himself be dragged from her bedside. If this was going to be his last moment with the love of his life it had to be under his control.

"I'm here," he whispered, before pressing his lips to her cold forehead once again – hoping against hope that it would not be for the last time.

And he silently stepped out of the room and collapsed onto the floor across the hall, unable to be any further away.