Hydrogen in our veins, it cannot hold itself, our blood is boiling...

[nolimitation]

It's a long drive from New York to Boston, and by all rights, she should be tired when she gets in. She's not. She can't stop running over every argument for why they shouldn't even begin to trust the other side, and trying to come up with one she hasn't already presented to Broyles. She can't stop glancing at the boxes of files on her passenger seat, wondering just how familiar the cases in there are going to be.

She takes the turn for the lab without even thinking, and when she realizes it, she sighs faintly, giving up on any idea of not working tonight. After a moment of thought, she reaches over to hit the button to call Steve when she hits the next stoplight.

"I hope I didn't wake you up," she says when he picks up, though she knows by now he sleeps less than she does. "Do you have any plans tonight?"

Comments

[n_o_p_e]

He stumbles, catches himself on the bedside to keep from falling, and is about to answer when it feels like an invisible hand closes around his throat. He can't talk, can't move, and from the corner of his eye he can see that his hand on the bed has disappeared.

Olivia's alone, for all she knows, and he can't speak to assure her it's not true.

His heart rate picks up enough to make breathing hard, not just with adrenaline. Fear. There's no struggle to make. It's like he's eyes suspended in nothingness, even if he tries to thrash against whatever holds him still and invisible. He can't protect her. He can't even try.

[subject13]

"...Steve?"

He's not moving, and she can hear her stepfather's footsteps coming closer and oh god, they need to move, they need to...

He's gone. He's gone he's gone he's gone she's alone and he's coming to get her and she needs to go, but if Steve's still here--

The door bursts open, a monster in the doorway. She can see her stepfather in it, if she looks hard, but when she looks at it, all she sees is the monster, burning eyes and massive hands and hulking muscles, so huge it has to duck to make it through the door, and Olivia gasps, backing up until she hits the wall. There's a window somewhere. There's a fire escape, Steve said, and if she can just get out...

"Haven't I told you not to run from me, sweetheart?"

Olivia goes totally still, breath caught in her throat. She's better than this, she's older and she knows better and... and she's a scared little girl all over again, and even when everything in her screams to run, all she can do is stand there, wide-eyed and terrified.

[n_o_p_e]

Olive!

He still can't move. He feels himself dissolving, being pressed into the wallpaper, watching as that monster stares Olivia down. Powerless. He can't breathe. He can't-

A very different scene. Olivia, a little older, talking to people he doesn't recognize. Olivia, an adult, acting as a representative of the Fringe Division. The team, their team, going through the motions of an average day as he watches - and then another day, and another, their hairstyles changing and their eyes tiring, wrinkles showing and hair graying, and still he can't move or speak.

No! Terror. That's what this is. Absolute fear. Watching another world spin on without him, seeing this time as the people he's come to care about live and die and grieve while he stands by in frozen silence.

Not again. Not again.