⠀

chapter forty eight ━ dark was
the night & suddenly
season eight, episode nine & ten

❝ there's no way— ❞

⠀
⠀
⠀

THE SAME NIGHT...
⠀

ALIYA LEVINE
to JACKSON AVERY (8:01pm)

are you dead?????

did you get my voicemail???

hello

⠀
ALIYA LEVINE
to JACKSON AVERY (8:32pm)

hi

i'm sorry

no pickles on the pizza pls

⠀
ALIYA LEVINE
to JACKSON AVERY (8:48pm)

jackson?

this is getting slightly
embarrassing now.
⠀

"I hate men."

The Levine woman announced to the table of women, which consisted of Meredith and Cristina, then she dropped her head down onto it rather dramatically with a very loud groan.

Meredith chuckled, popping a pistachio into her mouth. "Trouble in paradise?"

Another groan sounded from the table in response, and to that Cristina scoffed. "Please, she's got to be kidding. Her relationship belongs on the cover of those magazines."

"Are you guys in a fight?" Meredith asked sincerely, poking the brunette's arm in attempt to get her up from the table.

Her voice was muffled as she said: "It's not necessarily a fight—"

The Yang woman made a loud snorting sound, and Aliya was surprised Cristina hadn't began to spit out her beer. "You're so in a fight."

"We're not." Aliya assured, now sitting bolt upright on the stool. Though, she wasn't entirely convinced of that fact herself. "We're not in a fight, we've just had a disagreement, that's all. Couples disagree all the time. Aren't we allowed to disagree? That's not fighting, right? Fighting is if you've just found out your boyfriend's slept with an intern. That's fighting."

Meredith blinked at the rant. "He's not Mark, you know."

"Two very different people." Aliya stated through their mouthful, where she was now cramming pistachios into her mouth in a blind panic, storing them in her cheeks for winter like some sort of hamster. "I don't think I could get them confused because, like I said, we're not fighting."

"Is it about Elijah?" Meredith pried further. "Is that why the two of you are disagreeing?"

"No." Aliya scowled at the mere mention of his name, her lips pursed. "Yes. Maybe. I just don't want to fight about him."

"Well, Aliya," Cristina cleared her throat, propping both elbows up onto the table. "Your ex-fiancée has just randomly showed up out of the blue, it's obvious that McPrincess and Dr. Green Eyes are gonna have a fight about it, I'm sorry, disagreement over it."

Aliya frowned, because she knew that Cristina wasn't exactly wrong.

And, just like she always did, she looked around Joe's bar, desperately hunting for a way to change the subject.

When she found it, her face contorted into a grin as she extended her index finger in the direction of Alex Karev, failing miserably at trying to "pick up chicks at Joe's" (his words, not Aliya's). "Oh, god— that's the most tragic thing I've seen all day!" She cackled, clapping her hands once the twisted sisters looked over in his direction.

Now, the three women were roaring with laughter as Alex sulked back over to the table to joint them, looking like a kicked lost puppy.

"That was pathetic." Cristina grinned.

Alex slouched back onto his stool, and Aliya patted his shoulder in comfort, though it wasn't exactly comforting seeing as she was desperately trying (and failing) not to laugh.

"She told you to go screw yourself, we could hear it all the way over here." Meredith said through bursts of laughter, her shoulders shaking as she spoke.

"It's not 'cause she wasn't into me." Alex defended, his voice monotonous.

"Whatever helps you sleep at night." Aliya snorted, sipping happily on her club soda.

"Oh!" Cristina slapped her thigh, amused. "Does "go screw yourself" have some secret meaning we're not aware of?"

Aliya nodded, leaning onto the table, all three pairs of eyes casted on the Karev man. "Please, enlighten us, Alex."

He looked guiltily down at his drink, swirling his straw about in his ice. "I kinda already knew her— I just didn't remember."

A moment of silence passed between the four doctors. A moment of complete disbelief.

Because—

There was no way.

Meredith blinked, taking a breath. "You slept with her before and forgot about it, and then tried to pick her up all over again?"

"Alex!" Aliya gasped, using the back of her hand to slap him around the shoulder, her jaw hanging open wide. "You. Did. Not!"

The Karev man dipped his head, slurping on his drink through his straw.

"You're not even drinking." Cristina pointed at his coke, curling her nose up at the pathetic man before her very eyes.

"I have a history of Alzheimer's in my family. What's your excuse?" Meredith retorted, and Aliya on a tequila, a beer and a club soda found that to be incredibly funny.

Though, seeing as she wasn't on call, and she was in fact in a fight with her boyfriend, who cared!

"It's O'Malley's fault—"

"He's dead, Alex." Aliya deadpanned, pointing out that fact.

Alex rolled his eyes. "I mean, talking about dead people it throws me off my game, that's all."

"Oh, it throws you off your game?" Aliya teased, her cheeks now blushing a shade of pink which told the world that yes, she had had one too many and was starting to feel slightly tipsy.

She hadn't even heard Meredith's phone ring from the table.

"It's Janet." Meredith stared down at the caller ID, quickly darting up from the stool before turning to Cristina. "Can you pay for this thing—"

"Yeah, yeah, yeah." Cristina nodded, beginning to fish through her purse for some dollar bills as Meredith filed out of Joe's bar, holding her phone to her ear.

"I gotta run." Alex stared down at his beeping pager. "Would you pay for mine?" He asked Cristina, already fishing notes out.

"No." She shook her head, slamming bills down onto the table. "I'm leaving. I'm going to the skills lab."

"Oh, come on." Alex protested, and Aliya then took it as her cue to get up. Because, she might as well spend her time at the hospital, rather than alone in her bedroom, staring at the ceiling without a purpose in the world.

"She had the social worker on the phone. You can fish twenty bucks out of your pocket." Cristina then turned on her heel, bag on her shoulder as she disappeared out of the bar.

"It's fine, I got you covered." Aliya popped a few notes out of her purse and onto the table, hopping as gracefully as she could off of her stool. "C'mon syph-boy."

Alex scrunched his face up, raising a brow at Aliya's remark as he followed her out. "Did you just call me syph-boy?"

The brunette shrugged her shoulders. "Speaking about George and stuff reminds me of things, and I very briefly forgot about the time you gave everyone and their mother's syphilis."

"Thanks for reminding me." Alex muttered, rather displeased about that fact being brought to light again, under his breath.

⠀
—✩—
⠀

"I need a favour." Bailey stopped Arizona rather abruptly in the hall as they met outside of trauma one, Richard standing close behind them, both of them expression tensed up.

The blonde stopped briefly from where she was rushing about the place, the ER proving to be incredibly manic. "I'm kinda busy right now, Bailey, I'm sorry."

However, Bailey simply ignore the whole 'I'm kinda busy part', seeing as she wasn't exactly asking the blonde a question. "You've got Karev and Grey doing a baby run?" She gestured her head over to Alex and Meredith, now dressed in scrubs and Seattle Grace Mercy West jackets, carrying clipboards in their hands as they walked through the pit to the ambulance bay.

"Yes," Arizona raised a brow in suspicion, tucking a chart underneath her arm. "Why'd you ask?"

Richard sighed heavily, his eyes scanning around him to make sure there wasn't anyone eavesdropping. "We need Levine on that rig."

Arizona looked confused at what was going on, glancing back and forth between the two doctors in front of her. "I could actually do with an extra set of hands in the OR, and I was going to ask Levine if she'd—"

"We need her out of this building." Bailey interrupted her abruptly, pressing her the plans of her hands together. "We've told her to go change into scrubs already."

"I'm still not following, why do you—"

"Henry's here." Richard cleared up, angling his head towards the trauma room behind him, where the blinds were shut, stopping anyone from looking in. "We think it's best if Levine stays away from this one until we know what's going on."

Arizona gulped back a rising lump in her throat, nodding her head quickly as she spotted Aliya, fully sobered up and in scrubs, heading towards them. "Got it."

When Aliya reached them, she had a grin on her face, completely unaware of what was going on in the trauma room beside her. "Where do you need me?"

"Levine, hi," The Robbins cleared her throat, leading Aliya away from trauma one and away from Bailey and Richard. "I need you to go with Grey and Karev to Bentley Hospital to pick up a newborn with a tracheoesophageal fistula."

"Okay, cool," Aliya nodded, slipping on the navy hospital jacket as Arizona led her out into the ambulance, where Meredith and Derek were stood outside of. "Oh, hey! How did it go with Janet?"

Meredith and Derek both looked towards the grinning brunette, whose smile faded as she read their faces. They looked like the kind of people who haven't been told they're getting their baby back.

The Levine woman took a sharp intake of breath, her eyes darting back and forth between the couple in wide eyed panic. "What's going on?"

⠀
—✩—
⠀

"It's just— It's just stupid!" Aliya's jaw hung slack in the back of the ambulance, staring directly in front of her, not knowing exactly where to look.

For the past ten minutes of the ambulance ride, Aliya had not stopped talking.

However, the only thing that could actually come out of her mouth was: oh my god, how dare they, there must be something we can do, they're idiots and how unfair the situation was.

Because, it was unfair.

"I don't get it!" Aliya's voice was now strained, and Meredith was deliberating getting her roommates vocal cords removed. "You're Zola's mom!"

"It's probably a mistake." Alex Karev, for once the optimist in the trio, suggested (though he wasn't all that convinced of the fact). "You know, courts, they screw up all the time."

Meredith grimaced, rolling her eyes as the ambulance jolted, her shoulder pressing against Aliya's.

"You call 'em in the morning—"

"It's over, Alex." The Grey woman interrupted him, not wanting to hear any more false hope, or Aliya threatening to remove Janet's head from her shoulders. "It's been over for a while. Everyone knew it, no one wants to say it."

Meredith sighed in defeat, and Alex tried to rack his brain around for another solution to the colossal wreck of a problem they had on their hands.

"So, get a surrogate or whatever." Alex pitched the idea, though the dirty blonde just looked away from him.

"I think that's beside the point." Aliya said, pursing her lips and drumming her fingertips on her knees.

It didn't matter that she could have another baby.

She wanted Zola.

"You can't just write off having a family like that." The Karev man pointed out, trying to make Meredith feel better but it wasn't exactly helping her. "Get Yang to carry a kid for you, she gets knocked up at the drop of a—"

"If you don't shut up in the next three seconds, I'm gonna shove you out of the back of the rig." Meredith threatened him, her glare sending daggers his direction.

"You get his arms, I'll grab his legs." Aliya smirked, and a slight flicker of amusement passed over Meredith's features, before she returned back to her melancholia.

⠀
—✩—
⠀

"Hey, we're here to pick up a newborn, take her to Seattle Grace." Alex told a nurse once they had exited the ambulance and began to push the incubator through the middle of the hospital's hallway.

"You're looking for me." A doctor dressed in a shirt and tie stepped forward, with a very unfortunate receding hair line. " I'm Jordan Wagner, I'm really glad to see you guys."

"Yeah, I'm Alex Karev, this is Meredith Grey and Aliya Levine." He gestured to the two women standing behind him pushing the incubator along.

"Okay, listen, she was born six hours ago," Dr. Wagner began, grabbing one end of the incubator as he led the group of doctors in the right direction. "Right away, trouble breathing, stomach was distended, so we put down an NG tube, but the X-Ray showed it was just coiling in her chest."

"A 5-french tube?" Aliya immediately questioned, and Justin swung open a door.

"6." He responded, his words coming out frantic as he led them towards the newborn. "We've done everything we can to keep her breathing, but it's been a struggle."

Alex took a look at the baby, then back to the doctor by his side. "You don't have a neonatal mask?"

Jordan shook his head as the doctors moved over to the baby to start their assessment. "We're not set up for neonatal, or OB. She was an emergency delivery, otherwise, we would've sent her down to the hospital in Leavenworth." He explained, standing worriedly by the side of them, chewing on the edge of his lips as he watched them work.

"Pulse ox is seventy nine. Respiratory rate is eighty." Meredith read from the monitor. "She's got retractions."

Aliya furrowed her brows, they hadn't even intubated the baby! "Do you have a neonatal intubation tray?"

Alex snapped his head back to the doctor, now shifting anxiously on the balls of his feet. "How come she's not intubated?"

"The smallest tube we had didn't fit," He informed them. "Please tell me that you brought a neonatal tube."

The Karev man gritted his teeth, and Aliya zipped open the bag Arizona had give to them to take, searching for anything they could use. "We're gonna need X-ray in here for a post-intubation film."

"There's an intubation tube in here." Aliya retrieved it from the bag moving over to the baby's side. "What's the ETA on that X-ray?" She asked the wide eyed nurse stood by the baby's head.

"Uh— I'll get it for you right away doctor." The nurse scurried off and out of the door whilst Aliya slipped on a pair of gloves to start the intubation.

"This IV's no good." Meredith said with a sigh, sharing a look with Aliya, because it appeared this hospital was completely unprepared.

"Yeah, you don't even have a neonatal central line kit?" Alex questioned him, getting even more fed up with this hospital as the time passed on.

"No." Jordan shook his head, his hands deep into his pockets.

"IO needle?" Alex tried again.

Now, Jordan's eyes were to the floor as he said the answer they had all anticipated: "No."

"Alex, the baby's septic," The brunette doctor said just as the nurse returned back. "And, she's got pneumonia, you gotta call Robbins."

⠀
—✩—
⠀

⠀JACKSON AVERY
to ALIYA LEVINE (9:27pm)

Hey Aliya, my stupid phone
ran out of charge and Sloan's
just called me into the OR.

I just listened to your voicemail,
I don't want to fight about him
either, should we just drop it?
Get pickleless pizza later?

I love you.

( Message Failed To Send. )
⠀

"Dammit." Jackson muttered, scratching at his temple as he hit retry, though the same taunting message appeared on his screen.

He really should actually be on his phone, seeing as he was currently kitted out in a scrub cap and gown, ready to scrub into surgery, but when he saw the messages and voicemail from his girlfriend, he couldn't not double check.

He was about to try for a third time until his phone screen lit up with a call from a number he didn't recognise at all.

"Hello?" He spoke with a sigh into the phone speaker.

A voice he recognised replied back to him. "Avery, it's Alex."

"Oh, thank god." Jackson said in relief, holding the phone close to his ear. "Are you at Joe's? Is Aliya there?"

"Nope, not at Joe's." Alex said, his voice suggesting he would very much rather be at Joe's right now, instead of in a hospital in the middle of nowhere. "But, she's here with me, we're doing a baby run. I need you to get Robbins for me, stat."

Jackson started walking down the hall, making his way to the operating room he knew he'd find Robbins in. "What's going on? Is everything alright—"

"Avery." Mark called over to him from where he was leant leisurely against the front desk with Derek by his side. "What's the deal?"

Jackson stopped abruptly in the hall. "Nose is hanging off and a lot of soft tissue loss. Probably never damage. I'll let you know when Dr. Robbins is ready for you."

He sped off again, leaving Mark quite disappointed as he watched him in longing.

Once Jackson reached the operating room, he pushed through the door. "It's Karev." He told Robbins, putting the phone on speaker and holding it by the blonde's face, who was half way through her operation.

"How's it going?" She asked in anticipation, still operating on her patient as she spoke to him.

"The kid's septic. She's got pneumonia." Alex's voice echoed through the speaker, the phone line unclear seeing as they were practically in the middle of nowhere.

"Was she intubated when you got there?" Arizona questioned him.

"No, Levine did it." The Karev man answered, his voice lowering as he said: "They don't have any neonatal stuff here at all. We intubated, started an umbilical line to hand D10 normal saline and antibiotics, but her SATs aren't coming up, and all the oxygen's going into her stomach."

Arizona glanced up at Jackson, who was holding the phone, her brows raising. "You're gonna need to put in an Amplatz umbrella."

"They don't have a 3-0 ET tube." The Karev man snapped unintentionally, catching one of the scrub nurses in Arizona's OR by surprise. "You think they're gonna have an Amplatz?"

"All right—" Arizona paused for a split second, chewing on her lip from under her mask. "Elevate her head."

"Get her head up!" Shouting suddenly, Alex turned to them, and Aliya nodded, reaching for multiple cloths to prop under the baby's head.

"Okay, do they have a Fogarty catheter? They use those on grown-ups."

"A Fogarty catheter?" The Karev man questioned Justin.

"Yeah," The doctor nodded, and finally he had something they actually needed. "What else?"

"You're gonna have to thread the Fogarty down her trachea, pretty far down, then blow up the balloon and pull up until you get traction. That'll occlude the fistula and get the air flowing into her lungs." Arizona explained to him. "You're gonna have to keep the blind pouch clear on your way back. And, I'm not sure you have anything in your box that's gonna do that."

"How about an eight french suction catheter?"

"Yeah," The blonde nodded her head. "That'll work."

"Got it, all right." Alex paced back over to the newborn. "We're gonna call you when we get to the rig."

"Hey, Alex." Arizona called out, before he could hang up the phone. "You don't have a lot of time, you know that, right?"

"Yeah," The Karev man sighed. "I know that."

⠀
—✩—
⠀

Once they did exactly what Arizona had instructed them to do, the three of them began to wheel the newborn baby out of the hospital and back to the rig, with Jordan following close behind them, droning on about how grateful he was, and thanking them all profusely.

"How's the mom doing?" Aliya asked as they reached the exit, turning to him. "Does she know what's happening?"

"She's in post-op recovery." He answered her, ushering them along. "We're going to—"

"Wait!" A voice sounded desperate from down the hall, her words broken up by muffled sobs as a nurse wheeled her closer towards them. "I'm coming with you!"

"Dana?" Jordan turned to the woman, who was trying to get up from her wheelchair, her gaze fixed on what Aliya has assumed to be her baby. "Why is she out here?" He questioned the nurse pushing her long.

"She said if I didn't take her, she'd walk. I was afraid she'd try it." The nurse justified, staring at the floor with an expression of guilt.

"Please," Dana cried, tears streaming down her cheeks. "Let me come with her."

"Dana," Jordan said softly, crouching down before her. "You just had surgery, and you've lost a lot of blood."

The new mother shook her head in denial. "I'll be fine, please."

"I need you to take care of yourself." Jordan reached for her hand, giving it a tight squeeze as o at least try and comfort her. "These guys, they're the best. She's in great hands." He tried to convince, gesturing towards the three doctors.

"Please. She's my baby. We're supposed to be together. I can't leave her, she's so little." Dana's shoulders began to shake as she spoke, and Meredith left the incubator to advance towards the woman on the wheelchair. "Please! I have to be with her, please let me go with her!"

"I'm Dr. Grey, and that's Dr. Levine and Dr. Karev." Meredith started to talk once she crouched before Dana. "And, we're gonna take your daughter to the best baby surgeon there is."

Dana sniffled, looking past the dirty blonde over to the incubator, where she could see her daughter from afar. "She doesn't even have a name yet."

"Well," Meredith gave her a reassuring smile, reaching for her handy to hold. "You're gonna give her one when you come to Seattle and hold her in your arms. And until that time, I'm gonna take care of her. You hear me? I have her. Okay?"

Once Dana nodded, Mer took that as the cue to leave, so she returned back to the incubator, helping Alex and Aliya wheel it to the rig.

And as they were moving across the concrete, Aliya reached her hand out, squeezing Mer's.

Because, the thing about human beings was that they craved human contact.

To be shown adoration, to be loved.

And sometimes, you had to show the people you loved that you were there for them, and that all clinical trial related grudges were left buried in the ground.

⠀
—✩—
⠀

"You know what," Now they were back on the road, that cued Alex's continuation of whatever he was trying to accomplish. "Why not try adoption again?"

"Social services just took our kid away." The dirty blonde pointed out, her knuckles clenching around the edge of the ambulance seat. "What do you think, if we wait a week, they'll forget and give us another try with a new kid?"

"All right," Alex now saw that his suggestion was completely preposterous, so he decided to take a new angle. Or, the exact same one as before so it seemed. "So, get a surrogate."

"Alex." Meredith warned him, her jaw set out in a tense line, ready to crack.

"Mer's already said no," Aliya stated from where she was resting her head against the backboard, forcing her eyes to stay open wide. "I know you mean well, but it's best if we leave it."

"Why not a surrogate though?" He continued to question despite Aliya's attempt to shut him up.

"Because, I don't want a surrogate." Meredith said, matter-of-factly. "Okay? Just drop it."

"No," Alex fired back, still continuing on despite both women's desperate efforts. "You just don't give up like that."

"It's nice that you care, but it really isn't any of your business." She spoke honestly, and Aliya couldn't exactly blame her because this whole situation was painful, for her and for Derek.

They needed time to heal, and endless interrogations didn't allow for a moment's rest for her. It was becoming exhausting.

Even for Aliya, whose eyes were darting between the two like she was watching a heated tennis match. She was starting to get a headache from it all.

"It is." Alex countered, his face screwed up in a guilt ridden expression. "It's my fault. I can't handle being responsible for you not having kids. It's too much."

"It's not your fault." Meredith sighed, resorting to pulling at a loose thread on her jacket, rather than having to see Alex's face like that.

"You can't blame yourself, Alex." Aliya agreed with the woman beside her, glancing over at her best friend, who was frowning despite the reassurance.

"Yeah, it is." He grumbled, staring out the small window of the ambulance, where it was completely pitch black and the only thing to be heard was the rain hammering on the outside of the ambulance, and the sirens blaring.

Meredith shook her head after a few moments of silence. "No, it's my fault. I got to the ball rolling, I messed with the trial. What you did was turdy, but what I did was illegal."

Aliya chewed on her lip at the mention of it.

At the time, she hated Meredith Grey.

She hated what she did.

Aliya poured everything into that clinical trial, so much time and so much energy, just for it to be taken away from her, straight out of her grasp.

But, it was hard to keep on hating her.

Seeing as she was going through something so much worse.

"Who cares?" Alex shrugged his shoulders. "You don't just give up. It's lame. You're not a quitter. That's not what you are."

"I think you're gonna get her back." Aliya stated out loud, her eyes shut as her head bobbed back and forth with every bump in the road. "If the court cancelled your hearing, maybe they love you. They've seen how far you've come. Janet's seen how far you both have come, and she's seen how you are with Zola. She's your daughter, nothing's going to change that— Ow!"

Her hand flew up to her head as it crashed into the back as the ambulance jolted slightly, the lights flickering off for a brief moment, before the rig came to a complete standstill.

"Dude, what's the problem?" Alex called out as the paramedic pulled up the brake, the engine dead.

Aliya blinked in alarm, leaning to peer over to where the driver was supposed to be sitting, but she heard the opening of his driver's door. "Hey! What's happening?"

A few second later, the back doors of the rig flew open as the paramedic appeared, drenched in rain water.

"What's happened to the engine?" Alex interrogated, watching him as he retrieved some orange cones.

"I don't know what the crap it is." The paramedic admitted in a frantic manner that did nothing to make them feel any better. "I called another unit, but we're in the middle of nowhere. It's gonna take forever. I'm putting there out, and I'm gonna run back. It looked like there was a store or something about half a mile back. Maybe they got a truck. You gotta get out of the rig."

"What?" Aliya gawked, shaking her head in disbelief, gesturing to the baby lying in the incubator by her knees. "No, we can't get out of the damn rig we've got a baby."

"It's pouring rain and freezing. We can't go out there with the baby." Meredith agreed.

"There's no shoulder," Alex pointed out, seeing as they had broken down right on the side of a hill. "It's not like we can just take the incubator out. I mean, there's not even anywhere to stand."

"This thing is full of oxygen tanks." The paramedic explained, and they all knew what that meant. "We get hit, it'll go up like a Roman candle."

"Great!" Aliya let out a laugh, despite the whole situation being extremely unfunny, she clapped her hands together. "How lovely! What else do you suggest we do Jeremy, huh? Take a baby with pneumonia and sepsis out into the freezing cold Tundra! I don't think so! So, you better run over to that store and find us a solution."

Both Meredith and Alex blinked at the woman, whose voice very rarely reached that tone.

"Please," Aliya added after a few moments, and just from seeing Jeremy's face, seeing as the poor guy looked quite shocked by it all. "You're very good at your job."

"You gotta get out." Jeremy the paramedic told them once more.

"And, leave the baby?" Alex protested, disgusted by the proposition.

Because, there was no way in hell they were leaving this newborn here.

She was only a few hours old.

They wouldn't be able to live with themselves if they left her.

"She'll die!" Meredith's voice strained, completely unable to process what was going on.

Jeremy was proving no help. "You want to die?"

"Not particularly," Aliya said with pursed lips, crossing her arms. "But, we can't just leave a kid in here, are you crazy?"

"I'm putting these out," He held up his cones. "You better hope people can see 'em. You're on a hill and you're on a curve. I'm telling you, get out the damn rig." And then, he shut the ambulance doors, leaving them in bewilderment, their minds working overtime as they scrambled for the solution to this particular problem.

"I'm ringing Avery," Alex announced quickly, tugging out his phone from his pocket, tilting his head towards the brunette, his hand outstretched. "You wanna talk to him, or you still in that fight?"

Aliya huffed, leaning her elbows on her legs. "Put him on speakerphone."

After a few seconds, he picked up, and his voice blared through the speaker. "Hello?"

"Avery, get Robbins now." Alex spoke into the mic immediately. "The freaking ambulance broke down—"

"What?" Jackson interrupted. "Crap. You guys okay?"

"Everything is spiffing!" Aliya announced, rubbing the sweat from her palms onto her scrubs.

Before now, Aliya was relatively calm.

She was optimistic, even.

And now, she had a premonition something bad was gonna happen.

And, it's all Jeremy's fault for predicting their death right in front of their eyes.

"It's absolutely chucking it down with rain in the middle of the night, we're on the side of the goddamn road with a sick baby!" Aliya leant closer to the phone so Jackson could hear her even more clearly. "It's great! And, we can't get out of the damn road cause we can't leave this baby! We're not leaving this baby! We're on a freaking curve—"

"Aliya?" Jackson's voice crackled through the line, stopping her mid rant. "Just take a deep breath okay, breathe—"

"Don't tell me to take a breath!" She snapped, though she should really take his advice.

"Aliya, sweetheart, just breathe, it's okay. I'm going to the Robbin's OR as we speak, we're gonna find a way to fix this." His voice was calm, and even though they were in a fight of some sorts, it seemed to ground Aliya, and her heart rate started to slow down, just a little.

⠀
⠀
AT SEATTLE GRACE...
⠀
⠀

Jackson burst into the OR where Arizona, Mark and Derek were operating in, the phone pressed to his ear where he had a front row ticket to Aliya's mental breakdown, Meredith's heavy breathing, and Alex saying crap every five seconds. "Ambulance broke down, like, in the middle of the road. They can't move. They can't get out."

"Did they send backup?" Derek asked, glancing up from where he was operating.

"It's coming, but it's slow." Jackson responded, trying to keep it together thought it was pretty hard to, seeing as the love of his life was on that rig.

"Put them on speakerphone."

"Yeah." Jackson hit the button on his cell, holding it to Robbins' cheek.

"Alex?"

"We can't move. We're a friggin' sitting duck! We— the—" Alex's voice began to distort, and seeing as they were in the middle of nowhere in a rain storm, the reception was disastrous.

"All right, hold on. I can't hear you. Say that again." The blonde said, sharing a worried glance with the neurosurgeon opposite her.

"We gotta take the baby out of here," She heard his voice again, still a little distorted but coherent enough to understand. "But, we can't move the damn incubator and all this crap on a highway."

"Did you set up flares?" Derek questioned them.

"There's no freaking flares!" Now, Aliya's voice sounded through the phone speaker.

Determined to get them out of this, Derek made eye contact with Jackson. "Okay, leave the phone. See if you can get a helicopter up there.

"Yeah, take this." The Avery man passed his phone to the scrub nurse, before slipping out of the OR, moving down the corridor the fastest he had ever moved in his whole life.

"Right," Arizona snapped into action. "Secure the umbilical line with extra tape, you need the D10. Put the oxygen tank in the holster and take the paramedic kit and—

"Get out the rig." Derek muttered from behind his mask.

"—Swaddle her so that she stays warm—"

"We can't regulate—" The phone line crackled again, the connection dipping out once more.

Arizona furrowed her brows. "What?"

"We can't regulate her temp without the incubator."

"They may have to leave the kid." Mark said out loud, something that none of those doctors would even consider doing.

Exhibit A was Aliya, outraged by his suggestion: "Mark, are you on crazy land? 'Cause there ain't no way!"

"We are not leaving that baby." Meredith snapped from down the line.

The Sloan man sighed, shaking his head. "At least one of you should get out of the rig?"

"Oh really?" Aliya scoffed, and they could all picture her eyes rolling. "Just so we can watch it hurtle down a hill? No."

"What are they gonna do, flip a coin?" Derek added, bitterly, barely able to concentrate on the procedure when this was going on around him.

"They're sitting in a powder keg." Mark said, dryly.

⠀
⠀
SOMEWHERE IN THE
MIDDLE OF THE ROAD...
⠀
⠀

"Get out!" The Karev man said urgently, immediately after Mark had suggested one of them stay, and the other two to leave. "Aliya, Mer! Get the hell outta here!"

"Alex!" Meredith protested, not knowing what else to say.

She had a whole myriad of things to say, but most of them involved how idiotic that suggestion was.

"No!" Aliya snapped, shutting down his suggestion as fast as she could. "There's no way I'm leaving you here! You get out!"

"Go!" He urged again, gesturing towards the exit. "There's no reason for all of us to get killed."

"Well, we're no safer in the middle of the damn road!" Meredith pointed out, and she was right, standing there in the rain was no different from being trapped inside a metal can.

"I'm telling you to get out of the damn rig!"

Aliya threw an intubation tube at him, purely out of anger that he thought she would even think about leaving him here. "No way in hell!"

"Alex, if you want to go, you go!" The Grey woman spoke up, gesturing across the double doors that marked their way out. "We're not gonna fix you're guilt by us letting you die in an ambulance so that I—"

Aliya didn't remember much after that.

⠀
⠀
BACK TO SEATTLE GRACE...
⠀
⠀

"I just spoke to emergency dispatch. Another ambulance is coming now."

Jackson rushed into the operating room to give them the news, unaware of what had just happened a few moments before he had entered.

"The cops are a few minutes out, and the helicopter wouldn't be any faster since they leave out of Skykomish." Jackson told the doctors, who didn't utter a word in response, which only seemed to alarm him. He peered over at the phone, placed on a metal tray. "Are we still on speaker or what? Aliya? Are you there?"

"We were talking to them," Robbins said carefully, her throat drying out. "And, then there was a loud noise, and— we lost them."

If Jackson Avery was given a timeline, and he had to pinpoint the exact moment his stomach dropped, he would put a pin in this moment.

His vision went black, and he felt sick as his heart tightened in his chest, unable to even begin to comprehend what Arizona was even suggesting right now.

"No—" He shook his head, quickly reaching for his phone and dialing the number again, cramming it to his ear. "What are you even— No."

The call didn't even ring.

It disconnected immediately.

"No— there's no way. No." He shook his head frantically, jamming in Aliya's humber this time, even though it was false hope.

"Avery—" Mark tried to cut in, but Jackson simply waved him off, focusing his attention on the call, that cut off instantly yet again.

It was predictable.

Jackson knew the outcome, he knew that call would never connect, that it had no chance of going through.

But—

What if—

What if she was dead? What then? What the hell would he do?

And, Jackson had to live with himself knowing that they were in a stupid fight when she died.

It all seemed so insignificant now.

Everything felt insignificant when the person he loved most in this world could be lying somewhere—

Derek had spoken a word since the call had cut off, leaving them with the sound of a dull beep in its wake. Though, he grew paler, his eyes glazed as his eyes fixated straight down onto the cellphone, as if awaiting for it to magically put them in contact with them again.

"No!" Was all Jackson could say again, and it was as if he couldn't even form any other coherent words. "I can't— what if—"

"Don't panic—"

"Aliya was on that damn ambulance so don't you dare tell me not to panic!" He snapped instantly, searching in his phone for something, anything that could help him but, he knew there was nothing. There was nothing her could do to fix this. He didn't even know where they were.

He didn't even know if they were alive.

Arizona swallowed, taking a deep breath to try and remain calm. "Another ambulance is on the way, they'll find them—"

"There must be something we can do," The Avery man said, his voice desperate. "I don't care if I have to find them my damn self—"

"Avery, son," Mark cut him off before he could personally hire a search and rescue team to find them. "You gotta wait it out. You just gotta trust the ambulance will get there in time. And, they will."

"But, what if—"

"No." Mark shook his head, his hands still, seeing as they were operating at this moment in time. "We're not gonna talk about that. Now, Dr. Shepherd's going to but his instruments down, and you're gonna to take over."

"What?" Jackson frowned at the plastic surgeon, then back to Derek, who was still standing still, not even moving a muscle. "No, I need to—"

"You need a distraction, and Derek needs to leave." The Sloan man said, matter-of-factly. "The fancy part's over. Now, go scrub in."

Jackson stood there for a few moments, because there was no way he could even concentrate on surgery right now.

But, maybe Mark was right, maybe he needed a distraction.

Waiting around for news to come— the anxiety was going to eat him alive.

⠀
—✩—
⠀

Once the ambulance had finally stopped hurtling its way down the hill, Aliya groaned, placing both of her palms onto the floor of the ambulance as she made an attempt to push herself up, though as soon as she moved even an inch, her vision grew blurry, and she couldn't even see straight.

It all had happened to fast, but the falling, god, the falling happened as if the tape was rolling in slow motion, and every single thing in the ambulance was jostled from once side to the other.

Was it possible for something to happen so fast and so slow at the exact same time?

Or, was that just the crazy talking?

And, what made her eyes fly wide open this time, despite the blur, was Alex. Because, in complete slow motion she had watched him hurtle into the metal.

"Alex—" She murmured, her voice catching in her throat so it didn't even sound like his name coming out of her lips.

"Aliya? Meredith?" The Karev man called out, and his voice felt like a distant echo to Aliya, and she hadn't even realised he was right before her eyes until he became a blurred outline in her field of vision. "Are you okay? Aliya—"

She blinked back the blur, and Alex moved to brush her bangs out of the way of her forehead so he could take a look. "I'm fine! Are you okay? Alex!" Her hands moved to his shoulders, mainly to check if her was alright, but mainly for her sake. Because, she was pretty sure she would fall back down if she wasn't careful.

"Crap!" Alex winced, and the brunette felt a sharp pain ricocheting in her head as he ran his fingers across it. "You're bleeding!"

"Alex, are you okay!" Aliya countered urgently, because she couldn't really care less about herself.

"I'm fine, you're bleeding." Alex deadpanned, and Aliya caught a glimpse of his fingertips, coated entirely in her blood. "Crap, Mer, you're bleeding too. What are you doing?"

The Levine woman reached a hand to her forehead as she turned, and she felt the cold damp of something lacing the tips of her fingers.

Drawing her hand away, all she could see was crimson.

"Get me a blanket," Meredith ordered, snapping immediately into action, even with a head laceration that looked pretty deep. "I'm taking her out."

"Mer, put her back in." Alex appeared by her side immediately, rubbing the blood onto his scrubs.

The Grey woman simply shook her head, grabbing blankets and swaddling the newborn baby with the help of Aliya at her side. "She just got thrown around a plastic box. She needs to be held, I'm not putting her back in."

"Are you okay?" Alex asked, as he too moved to help them get the baby out.

"No, I'm not okay." Meredith replied back truthfully, the baby now swaddle in her arms, though she was still connected to so many wires.

"We need to see what hit us," Aliya suddenly said, looking across at the ambulance back door. "What if they're—"

"Listen," Alex said forcefully to the two women, grabbing a bunch of stuff in his hands. "We gotta get outta here before this thing blows."

"Well, how are we gonna do that? She's connected to a million things." Meredith responded, her tone exasperated.

"You got the bag and the baby, I'll get the O2 tank, and Aliya grab the IV." Alex ordered, and Aliya reached across for the IV, helping Alex as he moved quickly. "And, we're gonna disconnect her from the antibiotics."

Meredith watched them as Aliya attached the ambu bag. "Is that gonna be okay?"

"Yeah it's gonna have to be."

Once they had everything ready, Alex went first to push the ambulance door, and all four of them carefully stepped out onto the road, relieved they had finally got out of the rig.

Aliya took a breath, the cold breeze taking her by surprise.

Though, as she looked down at the tarmac, she noticed something.

Was that a shoe?

She furrowed her brows as her eyes trailed up to what was looming before her, and just by the sigh of it—

"Oh my God—" She murmured, because in front of them was a camper van, completely flipped on its side with smoke coming out straight from the engine.

But, that wasn't even the worst part.

Because, before the camper van, three bodies led out in front of it.

And they all realised, they weren't out of the woods just yet.

Aliya rushed straight over to the person led the furthest away by the van before anyone could stop her, crouching down beside the woman.

"Hey, ma'am? Can you hear me?" Aliya carefully turned the woman onto her back, reaching to feel for a pulse which was weak, but it was there.

"Sir?" She heard Alex say next to the person closest to their rig. "Can you move? We need to get you off this road."

"Honey!" The man called over to the woman Aliya was examining, who had a multitude of crash injuries. "Jessica! Answer me!"

"Mom?" A voice called from behind Aliya, and as she turned her head, she was met with a young girl with dark brown hair stumbling from the ambulance.

The girl nearly lost her balance as she stepped out of a broken window, glass shattering as she moved.

"Mom! Wake up!" The girl dropped down by the side of Aliya, shaking her mother's shoulders desperately. "Please! You need to help! What's wrong with her! The van—"

"Hey, honey, what's your name?" Aliya questioned the girl as she unzipped the bag she had brought over, searching for something, anything she could use.

"Lily." She let out a sob, holding a hand up to clamp her mouth.

"Okay, perfect, well, Lily, my name's Aliya and we're gonna do the best we can to help your family, alright?" Aliya assured, her voice unusually calm for a woman who had just got thrown around inside of an ambulance, with blood gushing down her cheek. "Now, take a deep breath—"

Aliya snapped her head around, her eyes darting over towards Meredith, holding the baby in her arms.

"Okay, Lily, do you see that doctor over there!" Aliya gestured her head over to the dirty blonde as her hands started piling gauze into Jessica's abdominal injury. "That's Meredith, and I need you to go see her, because she's gonna give the baby to you, is that okay?"

"What? No! I can't do that—" Lily started to panic, darting to her feet. "I don't even babysit— I— I can't do that!"

"You can, Lily! Okay? Aliya countered, blinking down at the gauze that finally started to stop the bleeder, which she then began to bandage up.

"Lily—" Meredith called over to the girl, who was now walking towards her, away from Aliya. "Do you want me to help your family or not? Three sets of hands is better than two. Hold the baby."

Lily nodded begrudgingly as Meredith placed the baby in her arms.

"Okay, I need you to squeeze. One, two, squeeze."
Meredith demonstrated with ambu bag.

Lily looked at her with widened eyes, unable to comprehend what was happening around her. Nobody could blame her though. "What if I mess up?"

"You're not gonna mess up, Lily." The Grey woman reassured. "One, two, squeeze. Count out loud so we can hear you."

"Okay, one, two, squeeze. One, two, squeeze—"

"No matter what you do, don't stop squeezing."

⠀
—✩—
⠀

A few moments later, they had managed to get all four of them wrapped in blankets and out of the middle of the road together, so they could assess their injuries properly.

Aliya had gotten Lily something to sit in, so she could sit there and focus on keeping the baby in her arms alive.

"Is there any tape in there?" Meredith questioned as Alex emerged from the ambulance with more first aid kits. "I gotta do some adhesive dressing."

"Probably, I just grabbed whatever." Alex replied, dropping a bag by the side of Meredith.

"Is my mom okay? Mom?" Lily called out.

"Lily, keep counting." Meredith ordered, and Aliya retrieved her stethoscope out, pressing it to the mom's chest.

Lily glanced at them with watchful eyes. "Why isn't she talking?"

"Lily!"

"You don't have to worry about that right now, okay." Aliya put her stethoscope away. "We're gonna try our best, we just need you to concentrate on the baby, you got that?"

Lily nodded her head, looking down at the bay in her arms. "One, two, squeeze. One, two, squeeze—"

"How's the mom doing?" Alex called over from where he moved over to assess the grandmother.

Aliya sighed, searching the first aid bag. "I may have to intubate."

"I see grey matter, brains are on the ground." Alex sighed from where he was kneeling beside her.

"Wait—" Lily stared over, her breath catching in her throats. "That's Nana, that's my—"

"Lily, I know it's hard but try not to look, focus on the bag." Aliya advised, because no kid should have to see this.

"There's nothing we can do." The Karev man said, moving on to the other girl by the side of him. "Oh, crap. This kid's got a shard of glass in her eye. She's unconscious, her pulse is low."

"That's my sister— That's Abby—"

"Lily! See the blinker on the van?" Meredith pointed over to it, the amber light flashing every two seconds. "Just watch the blinker and keep counting. One, two, squeeze. One, two, squeeze—"

"The kids! The kids!" The dad groaned, squirming from underneath his blanket.

"Your girls are okay, all right?" Alex informed him. "I just helped one, and the other one's right over there."

"And, Michael, what about Michael?"

All three doctors looked up from what they were doing, Aliya's hands still over where she was getting ready to intubate the mother.

"There's another kid?" Meredith questioned, darting up from the ground to go investigate.

"Oh, crap, there's no pulse." Alex then started compressions on the dad, and Aliya mental crossed her fingers because there's no way this kid had to watched her grandmother and her dad die in the space of ten minutes.

"Michael!" Meredith called out, advancing closer towards the camper van on the other side of the road to them.

"Dad! Dad!" Lily sobbed, tears streaming down her cheeks as she watched the Karev man perform CPR.

The dirty blonde looked over her shocker. "Lily! Keep counting!"

"One, two, squeeze—"

Now, Aliya began intubating the mom, but in her periphery, a flash of light was coming from the road, and she narrowed her eyes at it. "Alex—"

He glanced over to where the brunette had gestured to his, his eyes squinting to make it out. "Meredith! There's a car coming!"

"Hey! Mer!" Aliya called out also. "Get out of the way!"

"You gotta get out of there!" Alex yelled urgently, but they couldn't even see Meredith anymore.

"He's trapped!" They heard her voice reply, and Aliya saw her head poke out just from over the top of the van. "I have to get his legs free!"

"There's no time!" Alex shouted, out of breath from the chest compressions

Aliya heard Lily cry from where she was sat behind her as she was guiding the ET tube into her mother's mouth. "Oh, my God!"

"Lily! It's okay, see that blinker? One, two, squeeze, you're doing great!" Aliya assured as enthusiastically as she could whilst making sure she didn't screw this intubation up, but it was hard to be optimistic or concentrate on anything when Meredith had just set out on a death mission.

"Meredith! You gotta get off the road!"

"She's not moving! Mer!" Aliya called out for her again, unable to look up or even move to get her out of the way, and nor could Alex who was trying his hardest to save the dad's life. "Get out the damn way!"

Half a second later, Aliya watched as Meredith hurried out from behind the ambulance, advancing across into the road, directly in the line of fire if the car were to turn that curve.

"Meredith! What the hell are you—" Alex panted struggling to speak with every compression he did. "They're not even gonna see you! Meredith! What are you doing?"

"Stop! Please!" Meredith called out, jumping up and down on the tarmac, waving her hands in the air.

"Meredith!"

Aliya didn't know what it was, but somehow Meredith Grey had all the goddamn luck in the world.

Because, by some miracle, the ambulance saw her, stopping abruptly right on the curve, about less than a metre away from her.

"Son of a—" Alex dropped his head down, his back hunched over as the dad's eyes began to flutter open. "Okay, alright, you're okay. Just breathe. Help is here."

Aliya breathed a sigh of relief, finally finishing intubating the mother so she could hold a hand to her chest, which felt as if it was going to explode right out of her. "Remind me to yell at her once we're outta this mess."

⠀
—✩—
⠀

"Okay, I gotta Jessica Anderson, multiple crash injuries, I had to intubate her in the field—"

Aliya's ambulance was the first one to get to the bay, and as the ambulance came to a stop, she instantly started explaining what had happened to Owen, who helped down from the rig.

"Take the mom to trauma two," He ordered, walking with her into the emergency room with a clipboard, the gurney being wheeled right behind them. He stopped the brunette, letting the gurney overtake them. Owen's eyes narrowed at her face, which she couldn't see but it looked as if she had just stepped out of a halloween party. "Levine, you're bleeding, you gotta get that checked—"

"I feel fine, it's fine." Aliya brushed him off, trying to manoeuvre around him to get to trauma two to finish treating her patient.

Owen wasn't exactly convinced, seeing as blood had dried on the right side of her face, dampening her hair and reaching all the way down to her cheek. "Levine, you were just in a car accident. I'm not letting you in there until you get—"

"Fine! Hang on—" Aliya breezed over to one side of the emergency room, taking a band aid from one of the drawers. "Give me one second."

"I think you're gonna need a little more than a band-aid." Owen crossed his arms, watching her as both Derek and Meredith filed through the emergency room. "Shepherd, knock some sense into your resident."

The neurosurgeon looked puzzled, that was until he saw Aliya, squinting into the mirror as she manoeuvred a band air into her forehead.

"Crap, Aliya—" He muttered, approaching her to take a closer look at her head lac.

"I feel fine Derek, honestly. I'm fine. It probably won't even scar." Aliya said, matter-of-factly, turning on her heel though, Derek caught her arm, bringing her to a standstill.

"No headache? Dizziness?" He questioned, drawing out his flashlight to check her pupils, in which she reacted by huffing, though she didn't bother trying to swat him away. "I swear to god Aliya if my best resident drops dead of a brain bleed—"

"Well, it's a good thing the best neurosurgeon in the state is in the room with me." Aliya grinned, and it had appeared her band aid was doing nothing, seeing as it was now on the floor from the extent of how much she was bleeding from her head.

"There's no way you're practicing medicine until you get stitches." Derek replied, though Aliya's attention was elsewhere, because a nurse threw open the door to trauma two.

"Dr. Levine, she's coding!"

"What?" Aliya quickly rushed into trauma two before anyone could stop her.

She didn't even look back at Derek, or Owen for that matter.

"How long has she been coding? Crap!" Aliya interrogated the code team as she took over the paddles.

"Just a few minutes—"

"Charge to 200." Aliya ordered, cutting them off and desperately looking at the monitor for any sigh of life. "Clear."

The shock sounded, but the monitor didn't show a flicker of a heartbeat.

"Charge again. 250 this time."

Flatline.

And, for the next fifteen minutes, she still couldn't get Jessica back.

Aliya took a breath, though something shifted in her peripheral vision, and she caught a glimpse of Lily standing at the window, balling her eyes out as she watched her mom. "Again. Make it 300."

"Dr. Lev—"

"Again." She spoke urgently, her eyes training on the monitor.

And, once the shock was delivered—

Nothing happened.

"Time of death," Aliya put down her paddles, and Lily sobbed even harder on the other side of the glass. "2:27am."

She abandoned them all in trauma two, pushing out of the door to face the young girl, who had just lost two of her family members in the space of a night. "Lily, I'm so sorry—"

Lily clamped a hand to her mouth, muffling her sobs as she crashed into Aliya's shoulder, crying right into it.

Silently, Aliya wrapped her arms around her, comforting her as best as she possible could.

Because, would do you say to someone who's just lost two of the people she loved most in this world?

It seemed no words in the English language could cover it, to make the pain go away.

"C'mon," Aliya squeezed Lily's shoulder after sometime stood in the middle of the emergency room. "Let's go grab you some water."

Lily nodded, swatting at her eyes, that were now puffy and tear stained.

"Dr. Levine, don't move another inch." Owen ordered from wherever he had spawned from, his hands braced sternly on his hips.

Aliya's brow raised. "Don't you have a surgery to scrub into?"

"Yes," He snapped, his tone rough. "But, I've been told one of my resident's still hasn't been seen to yet. Grey's been seen to, Karev's been seen to—"

"Are they—"

"—and they're fine." Owen finished, glaring at Aliya who had a crying teenage girl attached to her arm. He turned towards a nurse, who was standing behind the desk. "Sarah, please could you come and take care of this young girl for Dr. Levine?"

Sarah nodded her head, coming over to usher Lily away, who looked back at Aliya as she descended the hall.

It seemed that without something to focus on, it had all caught up with Aliya.

It was funny how trauma worked.

That, when you were distracted, it kept your mind off the pain.

Now without something to occupy herself with, she brought a hand up to her head with a wince, black clouding her vision as her arm grew heavy.

Actually, it had seemed that her whole body grew heavier.

"Levine?" She heard Owen say, though his voice was distorted, and she couldn't quite understand what he was saying.

Nothing made sense anymore, and it was as if her whole world shifted on its axis, and it seemed she had forgotten how to move, to even talk.

"Aliya!"

A voice she knew too well, the one she could recognise even if she felt as if she was going to pass out came from behind her.

And, she turned to him in relief, Jackson's blurred figure approaching her so fast as he pulled her quickly into his arms, his hand finding the back of her head as he held her tightly towards his chest, as if her had no intention of ever letting her go ever again.

"God, I thought I lost you." He pulled her in tighter, pressing a kiss to her temple. "When the call disconnected, and Robbins said they heard something crash on the line, and you— I— I thought I lost you—"

"You haven't lost me, it's okay, everything's okay, I promise. It just all happened so fast, the storm was crazy, then all of a sudden—" She managed to get the words out, her voice raspy as she held him tighter, focusing in on his heart beat hoping that it would ground her, like it always did.

But, the whole room was spinning now, and she wasn't sure if she could hold on much longer.

"Are you okay? Are you hurt—" He pushed her back by her shoulders, instantly catching onto the blood coating over a quarter of her face. He concentrated as he pushed her hair back, running his fingertips carefully across her cut, his eyebrows knotted. "Oh crap, that looks pretty bad, you need stitches, c'mon, I'll do them for you—"

"I—"

All of a sudden, she couldn't hold on anymore, and she collapsed straight into Jackson's arms as the whole world around her went black.

⠀
—✩—
⠀

When she came round, everything was hazy.

She tried to recall what had happened when her head had hit Jackson's chest, and the warm feeling of his body against hers sent her off, but she had no idea what had happened.

All she could feel was a hand in her own, warm skin pressed against her contrasting cold palm.

She peeled her eyes opened, blinking to focus on him, sat in a chair by her bedside. "If you've butchered my stitches, Avery, I swear to god—"

Jackson's eyes flew open at her voice, jolting upright in the armchair he had nearly fallen asleep him. "Oh, thank god! Don't you ever do that to me again, you hear me? Never again. I can't loose you, you've gotta stay alive."

He pressed his lips to her hand, relieved she had finally come around. "I'll try not to, though it's quite hard to prevent, seeing as it's quite unpredictable, you know the whole car crash thing." Aliya grinned despite it all, looking around the hospital room she was in.

"I'll just have to wrap you in bubble wrap every time you step foot in a car." Jackson joked, now kissing her forehead gently, right where he had stitched her up several hours before.

The brunette smirked, though every bone in her body ached, her muscles fatigued. "What about planes?"

"Good idea," He enthused, not letting her hand go. "I'm going to have to bulk buy it from Costco."

She laughed at that, reaching up to scratch her temple, noticing she was connected to a couple of different wires. "What happened?"

"Well, you passed out. You lost a lot of blood, and to add to it, you've got a concussion." Jackson informed her, and she sighed, her lips pursed.

That explained the blinding headache.

"How's Alex?" She moved onto the next question, now that they had gotten what was actually wrong with her out of the way.

"You just missed him, actually. He's gone to get a breakfast sandwich."

Aliya furrowed her brows at the mention of breakfast, seeing as the last time she remembered was half two in the morning. "What time is it?"

Jackson glanced across at the clock on the opposite wall. "Eight am, you've been out for about six hours."

"Six hours!" She darted up right in surprise, looking towards her bedside table in search of her phone. "Shit! April moved the fitting appointment to today."

"Hey, sweetheart," He smoothed her hair back with his hand, trying to stop her from making any sudden movements. "Don't worry about that—"

She reached over to the hospital landline, punching in her brother's number. "I need to meet Trent and Henry in an hour!"

"Oh, Aliya—" Jackson started, but she wasn't listening. Once it began to call his number, she put the phone to hear, waiting for an answer, but he didn't pick up, sending it straight to voicemail.

"He didn't pick up. I'll have to try Henry." Aliya chewed on her lip, punching in another number to try out.

"Aliya—"

"Yeah?" The brunette held the phone to her ear, looking into his eyes and she waited for the call to connect.

Though, the expression on his face wasn't something she would have expected.

Not even in the slightest.

Because, behind his eyes something was torturing him, and she didn't know what exactly, but she knew it must be something.

He dipped his head to look at her bedsheets once he heard the call had gone straight to voicemail.

"What's wrong? Jackson?" Aliya tilted her head innocently, and he looked up.

He had to tell her eventually. She had every right to know.

"Aliya," Jackson straightened up in his chair, reaching for one of her hands, the one that wasn't holding the phone. "I was going to tell you once you've started to feel better, but it's unfair to you to wait. But, I need you to remember to breathe."

Aliya narrowed her eyes, suddenly growing nervous. "Okay," She replied, cautiously. "What is it? What do you need to tell me?"

Jackson hesitated, and somehow Aliya knew exactly what he was going to say before he could even say it. "It's Henry."

She had been the person giving that look to another person.

Hell, she couldn't even count how many times she had to tell another human being that someone they loved and cherished had died. She had done it today, with Lily. She did it the other day with a patient who died from a severe brain bleed.

It was the look of sympathy, or remorse, that would usually be followed by an 'I'm sorry for your loss'.

Aliya had even been on the receiving end of that look.

She knew that look all too well.

The Avery man squeezed her hand before he dropped the news on her, and she hadn't realised she was holding her breath. "He died last night."

The hospital phone fell from her hand, landing limply onto the bed sheets.

Nothing even seemed to pass across her face. It was as if her brain couldn't even comprehend what the hell he had just told her.

"What?" She managed to get out, and her head began to shake in denial. "No, you must be— no. There's no way Henry's dead, I won't— No— We were meant to seem him on Friday—"

"He came into the ER coughing up blood," He began to explain, otherwise there was no way she was going to believe him. "And, Webber ran a CT and found an Endobronchial Carcinoid tumour, he died in the operating room—"

"No, no, no—" Aliya began to sob, and Jackson pulled her into him as the realisation hit her like a tonne of bricks, though all she did was thrash against his chest, her knuckles crashing into his shoulders as she kept muttering the same word over again, her cries muffled by the grey fabric of his shirt.

It was probably the hardest thing he ever had to do, hold the woman he loved together as she fell apart in his arms.

Though, it was funny the way the world worked.

One moment, Henry was declaring to her that he was going to med school, and the next he was lying in the morgue.

It all happened in the space of a nighttime.

It really did happen in the blink of an eye.
⠀
⠀
⠀
⠀

( notes! )

henry burton, you're the loss of my life 💔💔

i'll never ever forgive the writes for killing him off. NEVER. what actually was the reason cause henry deserved so much better?????? HE & TEDDY HAD SO MUCH POTENTIAL & I'LL DIE ON THAT HILL

also i realised the past few chapters of scrub caps have been over 10,000 words long and i'm so sorry about that i don't even realise!!!! do you prefer the long chapters??

( word count! — 11,200 )