Asystole ✷ Mark Sloan

𝟬𝟵𝟮 a murderous act

𝙓𝘾𝙄𝙄𝙄.
A MURDEROUS ACT / 𝘗𝘐𝘛𝘠 𝘛𝘏𝘌 𝘍𝘖𝘖𝘓

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this is dedicated to the wattpad ranking algorithm because i know
she loves short chapters and, by proxy, absolutely despises me!
thanks for doing the bare minimum babe! ❤️

SEATTLE IN NORMAL TEXT
NEW YORK IN ITALICS

IS THIS MY DOWNFALL?

That was a question that would plague both Derek Shepherd and Elizabeth Montgomery for years.

It would strike Beth as she stood in her New York apartment eight hours after asking her boyfriend to choose between her and his surgical career. 

A twisted decision, a conversation that would not come lightly–– she'd stood, filling a glass of wine and thinking about the endings of things with a weight that had been on her chest all day. She was drinking to forget it, to shirk the guilt of making such a tense and curt demand. She stared at fingers that she almost didn't recognise, tried to avoid her reflection in mirrors, sensitive to the change that she might see.

She was thinking about the ending of things, twisting the words over and over in her head. 

What made an ending? What defined an ending? 

Was it just that someone called it that, said okay, right now, this is where this ends? 

But, were endings loyal to that? Did they happen when they were supposed to happen? 

Or did they persist? Did they creep a little bit over with sneaky suspicions and drowsy fingers?

Fuck knows.

It would occur to Derek as he left for work in Seattle on the day of Beth's Disciplinary Hearing, twenty-four hours after willfully setting his ex-sister-in-law's psychiatry career up in flames. 

It'd been a hard call, one he'd made with bared teeth and a slight stammer in his jaw. But he'd done it, without hesitation, with a mouth full of deja vu as he relived Manhattan over and over and over and–– His brow furrowed as he watched his hand tremble very subtly against the steering wheel in his car. There was an emotion in him that he couldn't quite name.

(How absurd would it be that nearly five years apart, they would carry the same weight in their chests.)

For it was the same feeling, they were knitted the same with the same pain. Although it would take Derek longer to recognise it, the sensation that hit him was the same as Beth's as she stood waiting for Mark to return to her. They had something similar about them at these times: the burn of alcohol at the back of his mouth.

Foot testing his accelerator, the taste of alcohol on his tongue, Derek was thinking about the ending of things. 

Was this really it? Was this how he wanted it all to go? 

Would this really be the end or would Beth find a way to bounce back like she always seemed to? 

Would she find a way to make the chips fall down in her favour or would it wipe her out completely?