A/N: I know. I'm doing it again.

But I don't care. I haven't seen any pieces like this, and I had the urge to write it. It's short and sweet and probably not nearly as ready for publishing as I think. But I cried writing it, so it passed some kind of half-ass test. Hope you enjoy.

xoxo

The Killer In Me Is The Killer In You

Disarm you with a smile
And leave you like they left me here
To wither in denial
The bitterness of one who's left alone
The years burn
The years burn, burn, burn

I used to be a little boy
So old in my shoes
And what I choose is my voice
What's a boy supposed to do?
The killer in me is the killer in you

("Disarm" - Smashing Pumpkins)

...

Emily Fields had always been the type of girl who loved far too easily. She had a habit of letting the people in her life get under her skin in a way that embedded them in her very core. They inevitably became a part of who she was – regardless of whether the sentiments were mutual.

She gave her all to those people. Anything it took to make them happy, she would do it. Even if it meant sacrificing her own well-being to ensure that it happened.

And more often than not, the people she had so generously opened her heart to turned out to be monsters. Selfish, apathetic monsters that took what they needed from her and then abandoned her, unceremoniously shattering her soul in the process.

Ali. Ben. Nate. Countless others.

And still, despite all of her unbearable luck with betrayal, she continued to let them in. For what reason, she did not know. Loneliness? Naïveté? Blind faith?

Perhaps it was the fact that the more supportive parent in her life came and went unannounced, fulfilling the oath he had taken long before she was born. He loved her more than words could say – she knew that with every ounce of her being. And yet – there was some distant resentment toward him. She blamed him for being gone. For re-enlisting every time that he did. For making the conscious decision to spend most of his life away on duty – away from home – away from her.

Maybe it had to do with the notion that her mother, despite all of the love she felt for her daughter, had never quite accepted her for who she was. It wasn't for lack of trying, of course. Pamela Fields had tried numerous times to make things right. The effort was there, but the results were typically bleak. "I'm sorry, I tried" may as well have been her permanent mantra. Emily had grown to expect it, and accepted that she would ultimately be disappointed – but that didn't mean it hurt any less each and every time it happened.

She had had her heart broken more times than she could count. And yet, she was always meticulously putting it back together, with the foolish hope that the next person who came along would treat it right.

She had felt the pain of saying good-bye. She had endured the unspeakable horror of losing someone she loved, fated to harbor an ever-present, underlying grief for the rest of her life. She had seen betrayal first-hand, and had spent days reeling in the aftermath of being fooled.

But nothing – nothing she had ever experienced could have compared with this.

Her blood stream was on fire. Her heart threatened to beat itself right out of her chest cavity. She had never known this kind of rage – an anger so powerful that it felt as though she was having an out-of-body experience.

Spencer had hardly been able to finish choking out the story before Emily was stomping out of the Brew – her boss calling after her that her shift wasn't over, her friends begging her not to go.

But none of that mattered anymore. It was a different worry for another day. Right now – she had a more pressing issue to take care of.

She didn't even knock. In retrospect, she knew she probably should have. But for all of the displaced emotions she was feeling at that current moment in time, little commonplace gestures like knocking seemed obsolete. Meaningless.

From the way it looked, he had been on his way out the door. He had his keys in one hand and cell phone in the other, arm still outstretched as though he had been reaching for the knob.

She brashly pushed her way in, placing one hand on each of his shoulders and shoving. Hard. She wasn't sure whether it was her adrenaline – her well-toned swimmer's triceps – or the fact that he was caught so suddenly off-guard. Maybe a combination of all three. Either way, he stumbled back so far that he had to catch himself on the kitchen counter, his eyes alight with surprise.

"How. Could. You!" she shrieked hysterically, pools of tears forming in the corners of her eyes.

"Emily," he began slowly, in a threatening, even tone she had never heard before. "Now is not the time to do this."

"Now is exactly the time to do this!" she hollered in return, balling her fists at her sides. "There is no other time! There will never be another time!"

He was standing up straight now, looking at her intently with his ocean-blue eyes. The eyes she had once found herself lost in – eyes that she could have fallen in love with, if only her brain had been wired differently. But now…now there was no emotion there, as there once was – and somewhere – deep down, beneath all of her rage – the absence she saw there terrified her and stunned her to her core.

"I trusted you!" she cried, feeling the hot presence of moisture traveling down the lengths of her cheekbones. "I defended you! I opened myself up to you when nobody else would give you the time of day!"

He squared his jaw tightly in reply, cocking an eyebrow in her direction. "Well maybe that was your first mistake."

The comment stung her, as though she had been slapped. She closed the distance between them once more, raising a hand in preparation to return the favor in a physically tangible way.

He was far more vigilant this time – he caught hold of her wrist in midair, holding her in a deadlock vice grip, his dark expression challenging her to try it again. "Listen to me, Em – "

"Don't call me that," she hissed, seizing her arm back from him. He had let go far more easily than she had been expecting. "Only my friends are allowed to call me that."

Something that resembled pain – albeit brief – flickered across his face. It was gone as soon as it had arrived, as though she had blinked and imagined the entire thing. His face was stone once more.

"You have no idea what you're getting yourself into," he warned. "You need to be more careful about who you trust. I tried to tell you about Nate – "

It felt as though her heart leapt into her throat and then unceremoniously took a nosedive back into the pit of her stomach. "The phone call at the cabin…" she muttered to herself. Her eyes flickered back to his, her voice so strained she could barely eke out, "Why?"

"He was ruining everything," Toby replied briefly, speaking with cool confidence. "He was a liability."

But she wasn't an idiot. There was a dynamic shift in the room so sudden that it may as well have screeched to a halt in front of her very eyes. Somewhere deep within the caverns of his soul – shining way behind that glassy expression – she saw something that contradicted him.

"You were protecting me," she discerned accusatorily. Despite the meaning of the words themselves, her delivery was cold.

"No." He inhaled sharply. "Like I said – he was a wrench in the machine."

But the slight tremor of his jaw betrayed him. She had entered his loft in such a fury that she hadn't noticed it before: carefully concealed ambivalence.

"Toby," she began quietly, unable to prevent her face from scrunching up in dismay. The tears had returned, an unwelcome distraction from what she had set out to do. "Please…you're my best friend…"

Neither of them spoke for several moments. The comment hung thinly in the air between them, as though walking an invisible tightrope. A part of her wanted to take it back – snatch it out of the space between them and protect it. The other part of her was beyond feeling regret – her heart too splintered with despair that it didn't matter what happened next.

When he raised his eyes next, she was startled by the candor she found there. Yes, there was still an effort to maintain the façade – a distinct attempt to deflect her words, batting them away like a pesky mosquito. A callous exterior that was being unmercifully chipped away with every passing moment. She had the sudden, inexplicable image of him trying to hold an armor suit into place as it came apart. Fumbling with the pieces and desperately making sure that none of them fell away to expose the tender, vulnerable flesh that lie beneath.

For in that brief moment, she saw that distant part of him that he was trying to suppress. The part of him that, a week ago, would have engulfed her in a gigantic bear hug, planting a chaste kiss atop her black locks, and told her how much he cared for her.

She had taken those moments for granted. And now – she would have done anything to get them back.

Toby collected himself quickly, and the person she used to know was gone once more. He marched quietly to the door, pulling it open to its full width and staring at her expectantly with a confrontational glare. "I think you should go."

She hesitated at first, struggling to relocate her bearings. When at long last she shuffled across the floor and stood before him, he averted his gaze to the dark sky outdoors. He was avoiding looking directly at her, and it did not go unnoticed.

She wasn't sure what made her do it. Perhaps it was the fact that it was like second nature to her – maybe it was the way that something had undeniably broken in his eyes – maybe both. But she wrapped her arms around his waist gingerly, afraid to wake the sleeping dragon within.

He tensed beneath her hold, but she felt a distinct shuddering in his frame. Anxiety. Fear. Anger. She couldn't be sure what its source was, but she had a pretty good idea.

"No matter what happens," she murmured against his shoulder, "The Toby that I know – my Toby – will always be my friend. No matter what mistakes he has made."

He exhaled shakily, and she was positive that he was trying not to cry. His jaw was clenched and his eyes were facing away, as if he was ignoring her all-together – but even in spite of this charade, it was the most certain she had been about anything the entire day.

She didn't know what his plans were – what motivation he had to torture them into insanity. Even blurrier was the line that separated his love from his hate. Because she knew – she knew he loved her. She couldn't explain how – she just did. He had been there for her when there was no one else. He had gone above and beyond the call of duty – above anything Mona could have possibly asked him to orchestrate. He already had her trust – had earned it long ago. There was no need to continue trying to prove himself. But he had – and here he was, choking back tears in a deliberate attempt to push her away. And the bewilderment that came with this revelation was too raw, too haunting for her to consider.

Emily couldn't have stayed a moment longer, even if she had wanted to.

She pulled away and, without a second glance, hurriedly raced out the door and down the stairs. In her haste she slipped on the bottom step, landing clumsily on her behind. Her tailbone was crying out in pain, but the rest of her was numb to the feeling. Detached from her physical being. All she was aware of was the gaping hole within her heart, and the agonizing way in which it was beginning to bleed out.

She squeezed her eyes shut tightly to keep the tears inside, but to no avail. They were seeping from beneath her eyelashes, and an anguished sob wracked her entire frame. She hugged her knees to herself, burying her face there, and cried. Cried for herself. Cried for Toby. Cried for anyone who had ever felt the keen sting of betrayal's blade and lived to tell the tale.

Emily Fields had a bad habit of letting people break her heart. Reaching into her soul and tearing it apart without mercy – poisoning her heart and infiltrating her mind.

It was all she had ever known. It had never seemed out of the ordinary.

And though she had no idea as to why she allowed it to continue – she did. She let it continue. Because people were not all good – but they were not all bad, either. Everyone had a dark side that accompanied the light. She knew that better than anyone.

Behind every villain is a cold, trembling child that is terrified of what it has become.

And everyone deserved a chance at redemption.

END