Chapter Text
Meredith had never gone camping before.
For most of her life she’d been an only child with a famous surgeon for a mother, therefore it’s fair to say as a family they didn’t get many opportunities to go on holiday together. Regardless, her mother wouldn’t have ever taken her anyway, Ellis Grey was not the kind of woman who would willingly sleep in a three-star hotel, let alone a tent in the wilderness.
Meredith hadn’t really minded; she’d never been very interested in sleeping in a forest either, but she knew George had gone a lot when he was a kid, and although he said he hadn’t really enjoyed it he did mention that you learned a lot of survival skills, how to find food, how to build shelters, how to make fires.
And as much as Meredith didn’t enjoy the idea of camping, she really wished she’d asked George about some of those skills given where she was now, isolated from the rest of the world in a snowstorm, their only shelter being a damp, narrow cave and their only supplies being a first aid kit and some energy bars.
Needless to say, it wasn’t an ideal situation.
And whilst she was grateful for the cover from the snowfall the cave provided, she wasn’t certain whether it was colder outside or in the cave. Yeah, knowing how to make a fire would be helpful right about now.
Meredith looked out into the flurry of white at the cave’s entrance and sighed, leaning back against the cave wall and sliding down to the floor as she once again came to terms with the terrifying reality of their situation.
It would be at least another couple of days before help could arrive given the storm, and even then, Meredith wasn’t sure what the chances were that the help would spot them given where they were, and that the chances of Meredith being able to make her way back to the crash site were improbable , the idea of trying to move Cristina there in her condition... near impossible.
The thought of her love caused Meredith to look back to where she had layed her down a little further into the cave, she had fallen asleep almost the moment they’d gotten into the cave, and as much as Meredith knew it was a bad idea to let someone with a head wound to fall asleep, it was probably best that Cristina be asleep for the next part.
Meredith then glanced down at the sewing kit taken from the first aid kit and let out an anxious sigh, stomach churning uncomfortably at the thought of what she had to do. Sure, she’d done sutures thousands of times, but there was something different about doing them on your unconscious girlfriend.
Still, at least this was something she could do about their situation, she could take off infection and sepsis from the list of potential hazards. Taking a steadying breath, Meredith then forced herself to turn around to Cristina, not allowing herself to stall any longer and just get this over with.
After checking Cristina’s head wound first and making sure it didn’t need stitches, she was grateful to find it still wasn’t bleeding and chose to simply place a clean gauze pad on and rewrap it carefully before setting her head back down.
Meredith then moved on to the next injury, gently putting her hands on Cristina’s leg and slowly unwrapping the already dirtied bandages, she then tried to make a closer inspection of the wound. The light was terrible, all Merdedith had was a small torch she’d taken from the doctor’s suitcase and given how she’d need to save its battery after this she’d have to turn it off, meaning they’d be in near pitch darkness most of the time which was just wonderful.
Even with the torch its light was flimsy and badly shadowed, Meredith could only make out the vague outline of the wound, but she supposed that would just have to do. Again, a fire would be really helpful.
First wiping the wound with an antibacterial wipe to get it as close to sterile as it could be, Meredith then opened the sewing kit and took out the needle and thread.
After inhaling deeply to try and steady herself, Meredith then leaned forward and carefully began to do the suture, making sure she was sewing as small and as neatly as possible given the bad lighting, and after reaching the end of the wound and pulling gently, cutting of the excess thread with scissors, Meredith was pleased with the fact that it shouldn’t leave a scar at least, as well as being thankful that Cristina was still peacefully asleep, chest rising and falling at an (almost) rhythmic pace.
After rewrapping the wound with new clean white bandages and tying off the end, Meredith then took another deep breath and in one fluid motion pushed Cristina’s knee back into place, carefully positioning it on the ground before moving onto her ankle and doing the same.
The sound of the bone snapping back into place made her flinch heavily, but Cristina was still blessedly asleep, seemingly undisturbed by all Meredith had been doing.
After taking a moment to steady herself, Meredith then cleaned her needle with another one of the wipes and moved over to Cristina’s side, wincing as she caught sight of the metal protruding from there, bandage wrap around already stained with brownish-red blood.
Slowly tearing of the tape and unwrapping the bandages, taking extra care to not jostle the metal in any way, finally all the wrapping was of, and Meredith was faced with the harder problem. How to remove the metal.
True the piece didn’t look too deeply embedded in the flesh, but Meredith needed to remove it in a way that would tear the wound or make it any worse. After moving the torch into a few different places and trying to visualise where the metal was on the inside, she eventually decided on an approach and took the top of the metal shard in-between her thumb and forefinger, placing her other hand on Cristina’s side to make sure she didn’t move to much when she removed it.
She was about to start pulling when she was scared half to death by the sudden patronizing voice “are you really going to pull it like that?”
Just about managing to stop herself from jumping up in shock, Meredith turned her gaze towards Cristina's awake and unimpressed facial expressing, as she replied suprisedly “Cristina, when did you wake up? You almost gave me a heart attack! And what’s wrong with my approach?”
Ignoring the first question entirely, Cristina let out a huff and replied matter-of-factly, “If you do it that way, you’re not going to have enough force to get it out in one, fluid motion. You want to pull with your hand wrapped around it halfway down, so you don’t have to travel so much when you do it.”
As Meredith moved down to do just that, Cristina grabbed hold of her wrist and continued bluntly, “unless you to turn your hand into a bloody mess, I suggest you wrap a bandage around the metal first.”
Meredith then sighed and went to the first aid kit, muttering under her breath, “I am a doctor you know.” to which Cristina replied wryly, “you’re not a doctor right now, you’re a concussed emotional doctor, which essentially means your method is invalid.”
Meredith then wrapped around the metal with a bandage and replied indignantly, “You’re more concussed than I am!” Cristina simply sighed and adjusted Meredith’s grip slightly, before responding only half jokily, “Maybe I'm just better than you.”
Meredith raised her eyebrows in Cristina’s direction and joked back, “You wish you had prodigy genes.” and both smiled at each other for a moment before Meredith’s gaze turned back to the task at hand and she swallowed nervously, asking uncertainly, “So, do you want me to do a countdown? Or...”
“Whatever makes you feel better.” was Cristina’s unhelpful reply as Meredith breathed sharply, tightening her grip on the bandage as she began to count down, “okay, on three. One... two... three!”
With that, Meredith quickly pulled out the metal and pressed clean bandages over the wound quickly, breathing heavily as she nervously asked, “are you okay?” Cristina then sarcastically replied, “I’m fine. Are you okay?”
Meredith then huffed and replied quietly, “fine, thank you.” before carefully taking off the bandages and wiping the wound with antiseptic, to which Cristina winced slightly but otherwise stayed quiet as Meredith cleaned.
Only speaking as Meredith began to suture the wound, “your stitches need to be smaller.” Meredith then replied irritably, “you’re not even looking.” Cristina then said flippantly, “I can feel it.”
Meredith sighed at that, but still adjusted her stitching style and soon she was done and got to work placing a gauze pad over the wound and securing with tape, then asking humorously “is the gauze pad at the optimal placement for you?” Cristina then replied teasingly, “I don’t know, could be a bit more to the left.”
Meredith then started to pack up the kit whilst chuckling slightly, stopped in her process however by a hand on her arm, and turned around to see Cristina trying to push herself up. Meredith then did suggest to her that she stay lying down to make sure she didn’t ruin any of her stitches but still ended up helping her lean back against the wall, Cristina’s hand still on her arm, or rather on her bandage. Oh.
In the middle of everything Meredith had already forgotten about her own cut. Cristina was already unwrapping it and reaching over for the suture kit, breathing heavily as she did so.
Meredith quickly picked it up and gently pressed Cristina back towards the wall, making her scowl, while replying reassuringly, “It’s fine Cristina, I can take care of it myself.”
Cristina then countered sardonically, “so you plan to do stitching on yourself onehandedly with your left hand on a place you can’t really see, excellent idea.”
Meredith then exhaled tiredly, and Cristina dropped to a softer tone, hand moving up to Meredith’s cheek as she gently spoke, “I’m fine, alright? I really am. But you’re not going to help matters by keeling over from gangrene. So just let me handle this so then we can both rest, okay?”
Meredith sighed and moved her hand up to rest on top of Cristina’s, replying tiredly, “okay.” Cristina then got to work straight away, cleaning the cut and the needle before getting to work.
The pain wasn’t pleasant, but it was hardly excruciating and honestly Meredith simply felt numb, which wasn’t a great sign but there really wasn’t much that could be done about it.
Cristina was finished almost as soon as she’d started, and after tying of and setting the suture kit back down she checked over her work before telling Meredith smugly, “Mine win.”
Meredith shook her head affectionately and responded quietly, “agree to disagree.” She then quickly tidied up the first aid kit and went to sit down next to Cristina, both pressed against each other shoulders and their hands finding each other seemingly by their own accord.
With her other hand Meredith reached over to the torch and went to turn it off only to be stopped by Cristina’s questioning tone, “what are you doing? We'll be in total darkness.”
Meredith then answered, “We need to save the batteries, we might want to use it to signal for help.” Cristina then looked at her disbelievingly as she asked, “do you really think anyone would be able to see it, given the storm and everything?”
“I don’t know.” Meredith sighed, looking down at the ground as though it had the answer to all their problems. Cristina continued, “I mean, do you think there is a radio system back at the crash site, maybe one we could use to contact help?”
“I don’t know.” Meredith replied more bitterly than she’d intended, breathing becoming more erratic as she began to feel overwhelmed by her own uselessness, her own inability to get them out of this situation.
Her own failure at protecting Cristina, the person she cared about most, and she was cold and tired and terrified and Cristina kept talking, asking questions she didn’t know the answers to, and she just- she couldn’t-
“Come on Meredith! We can’t just sit here and wait to starve or freeze to death! We have to come up with a plan, do you have any idea what we’re supposed to-”
“I don’t know Cristina! Okay, I just don’t know! I’m sorry that’s not enough but it’s all I've got. I don’t know how to get help, I don’t know how we can get supplies, I don’t even know how to start a stupid fire! I just- I can’t do this.” Meredith then pulled away from Cristina to the opossite side of the cave, unable to look at her without being engulfed in guilt.
********
Cristina normally didn’t mind fighting with Meredith.
Generally their arguments were competitive and honestly fun. Though that may be because Cristina won most of them, but on the rare occasions that Meredith won she was usually so pleased about it they’d end up forgetting what they were fighting about.
But this was different, this fight left Cristina feeling cold and dejected, as well as completely uncertain how to solve things. It was a rare feeling, after all, her and Meredith knew each other inside out, usually they just knew what to say to each other to bring them out of the darkness, or simply learn to survive in it with each other.
But now she was in the dark and she’d never felt more alone, and something told her Meredith was feeling pretty similar. But, still, Cristina wasn’t good at stuff like this, the sharing of feelings and comforting and stuff, she wasn’t a romantic gesture person either, usually they just told each other their problems and then made jokes about them, which really did help.
But now Meredith wasn’t talking to her, and she was at a loss as to what to do. She hadn’t meant to upset Meredith, she just hated feeling out of control. And given how they were trapped in a winter horrorland in a freezing cave with no plan and being unable to stand up! Well... she might have freaked out a bit.
Still, Cristina might not be able to solve the magority of their problems, but she could at least solve this one. Unsure of what else to do, Cristina tried to think back to when their last worst fight had been, and a memory suddenly came to her...
‘Cristina and Meredith had both had a terrible day. Cristina had been looking forward to soloing on an amazing heart transplant which ended up falling through due to someone else on the transplant list getting pushed up and requiring the heart more. Meredith ended up getting a surgery stolen from her by Alex Karev who then gloated about it all day to her.
Both arrived home much later than they’d planned to and in equally terrible moods. An argument had started, it was over something ridiculous like which takeaway to choose, but it ended up getting ugly, insults were hurled back and forth until Cristina ended up exclaiming “Well, if you don’t want me to live with you so much, then maybe I should just move out!”
“Maybe you should!” Meredith shouted back, followed by a thick, suffocating silence as both looked at each other in shock, only now realizing the seriousness of what they just said.
Cristina could feel tears building up in her eyes and blinded by anger and shame turned on her heel and prepared to walk out of the front door- only to stop in her tracks as suddenly the room plunged into darkness, the door out of view and unable too see her hand in front of her own face.
Realistically, Cristina knew it was just a black out, but irrational fear still clouded her anyway, causing her breathing to come uneven as she rushed upstairs, mumbling something along the lines of “gotta find a torch” not wanting to fall apart in front of Meredith right now.
Once she made it to the bedroom, she shut the door with a large ‘bang!’ and slid down to the floor, crying into her hands at the terror of having messed up her relationship with Meredith and having no idea how to fix it.
Eventually, Cristina’s crying calmed down, and after wiping her face and taking a few deep breaths to steady herself, she slowly headed down the stairs to try and fix the mess she’d left downstairs.
When she got to the end of the stairs, she expected total darkness, but instead there was a soft orange glow emitting from the living room. Now more confused than anxious, Cristina quietly made her way towards the room and let out a soft gasp at the sight before her.
Every possible surface, sideboard, drawers, everything was covered in candles. The candles gave the room a faint, beautiful, romantic ambience. At the couch, Meredith had set up a table, with candles, and some dinner set up.
Meredith herself was sitting on the couch covered in a blanket, and at the sight of Cristina hesitating in the doorway, immediately smiled and waved her over. Half certain this was a trap, Cristina causiously made her way over to the couch and sat down ridgedly next to Meredith, starting to speak quietly, “look Meredith, about what just happened-”
Meredith then simply pulled Cristina into a hug, which caused her to trail off mid sentence and sit awkwardly for a couple of seconds before giving in and leaning into the hold, hand coming to cup Meredith’s cheek as she leaned in and shared a warm, wonderful kiss with her, memories of their fight being wiped away into oblivion.
Eventually she came back slightly and moved to lean on Meredith’s shoulder, as Meredith replied quietly, “I found leftover chinese in the fridge. Is that okay?” Cristina leaned in to gently kiss Meredith’s cheek, immensly grateful for her girlfriend in that moment as she replied contentedly, “perfect.”’
Cristina didn’t exactly have a large supply of candles right now, but she did in the very least know how to start a fire.
Reaching over for the torch, Cristina held the light over the floor until she found what she was looking for, the pile of unclean bandages Meredith had left, most of them covered in dirt but luckily still dry enough to be used as kindling.
Grabbing the best strips, Cristina then arranged them in the optimal arrangement for kindling and started looking for rocks. All the activity attracted a previously silent Meredith, who then turned over to Cristina and asked tiredly, “Cristina, what are you doing?”
“Look around the cave and see if you can find some rocks and a couple of flint stones.” was Cristina’s reply, handing over the torch to a confused Meredith.
Meredith then began to question, “Cristina, what are you-”
“trust me.” Cristina interruptered, Meredith sitting still a moment longer staring at Cristina uncertainly before taking the torch and doing what she’d asked.
Coming back 5 minutes later with about 12 decent rocks and a couple of good flint stones, Cristina then told her to arrange the rocks in a circle around the bandages.
Meredith still looked perplexed but complied, and after arranging the rocks took the flint into her hand and asked uncertainly, “what am I supposed to do with these?”
Cristina then pointed her in direction of the bandages and explained carefully, “take one stone in each hand and hold them just above the bandages. Take the edge of the sharper looking one and run it quickly along the surface of the other at a downwards diagonal angle. Yep, that’s it, try and go a little faster and closer to the end of the bandage. Yeah, you’ve almost got it.”
A couple minutes later sparks began to come from the friction and maneged to catch the end of the bandage, creating a small, flickering, but definately there fire.
Meredith then gasped and smiled looking towards Cristina who also had a smile on her face, and whom then said to Meredith, “and that’s how you make fire.”
Meredith smiled and came over to Cristina, leaning against her as she spoke quietly, “thank you.” Cristina then gently kissed Meredith on the cheek and answered softly, “we’ll get through this Mer, we always do.”
Meredith smiled and leaned in to kiss Cristina, Cristina reciprocating happily and simply enjoying this moment, separate from everything else that had happened and everything to come.
After a while, Cristina gently pulled back and put forward delicately, “energy bar for dinner sound okay?” Meredith then squeezed her hand and replied, “sounds perfect.”
********
Meredith lay awake on the uncomfortable cave floor, watching the dying flames and ignoring the sounds of the howling winds outside in favour of listening to the quiet breaths of the precious person strewn across her chest.
Cristina’s curls had come to rest under her chin and her arm was wrapped around Meredith’s torso, Meredith’s arm wrapped around Cristina’s shoulders, trying to give her as much warmth as possible.
She was exhausted, all she really wanted to do was sleep, but she found herself unable to switch down with the fear in the back of her mind telling her that Cristina could stop breathing at any moment.
And so she stayed awake, holding her love close and watching as the flickering embers of the fire disappeared into nothingness, allowing terror to encompass her as she found no escape from the haunting fact that she truly had no idea what to do next.
To be continued...