McDreamy visited Meredith again in Thursday's 'Grey's Anatomy'

Now, Dr. Miranda Bailey (Chandra Wilson)—one of three original cast members remaining alongside Grey and Dr. Richard Webber (James Pickens Jr.)—frantically tried to make sense of what went wrong when DeLuca was rushed to surgery after being stabbed by the child sex trafficker he confronted. Simultaneously, Meredith is still in a dream-like space somewhere between life and death where Derek visits her on the beach. Dempsey first reprised his character earlier in Season 17 and he returned before Thursday night's first commercial break. 

"You're back!" Meredith yelled toward a laughing Derek, who is fishing as he often did when he was alive. Their conversations weave through how their youngest daughter, Ellis, reminds Derek of Meredith, and why they can't actually touch.

At one point, in real life, Dr. Cormac Hayes (Richard Flood) begs Meredith to fight after Dr. Teddy Altman's (Kim Raver) attempt to take her off the ventilator failed. Hayes' words echo into the beach, where McDreamy tells Grey he should "hear him out" and not to worry because they will be reunited when the time is right.

Teddy is having an especially hard time with DeLuca's death, as she keeps hallucinating and thinking Hayes is DeLuca. She sinks even further into a psychotic break during DeLuca's memorial service held in the hospital's parking lot, where he reappears this time in the form of the replaying of his application video to join the program at Grey Sloan.

The posthumous cameos make good on showrunner Krista Vernoff's tease to The Hollywood Reporter last week that fans "will see him again." Gianniotti added: "Even though his life has come to an end, there's many ways to show our characters who have passed. I look forward to tell some other stories in those ways. Maybe there's flashbacks or other scenarios where we can see DeLuca. That's about all I can say. But it's not a drill; he's definitely died."

Next Thursday, Dr. Owen Hunt (Kevin McKidd) grows increasingly concerned over Teddy's condition, as she continues to mourn DeLuca.