A/N: Hey guys! So this is my take on the episode 'Lockdown'. And by my take, I mean I'm completely rewriting the whole thing. Oops! I hope you enjoy it - it'll be multi-chapter and very, very Cadley orientated. The first chapter is a bit short, but I needed to get the establishing chapter over with - I hope you still enjoy it, and I'll try to update again ASAP. Please leave reviews and let me know what you think!
This first chapter is dedicated to my favourite little honeybadgers. Hope you like it. x
"Code seven, code seven. All nonessential personnel and guests, please remain where you are…"
Brilliant. Remy Hadley let out a small huff of frustration and, at the sight of security locking the cafeteria doors, reluctantly returned to the seat she'd just vacated, and what was left of her luke-warm coffee.
Quite frankly, this was the last thing she needed after having just wrapped up their latest case – a young boy presenting with unexplained muscle weakness, tremors and sudden blindness, which turned out to be abetalipoproteinemia. It was treatable, but not curable. News she still struggled to break, even after so many years, even if she would never allow her internal conflict to surface, would never give away even a hint of weakness. But right now, having not been home in two days and feeling the strain of near exhaustion, she was very much yearning for the welcomed call of her own bed. From the looks of things, it didn't seem like that would be happening any time soon.
"I guess we're stuck here, then."
Remy was shaken out of her thoughts by a voice, soft and familiar, teasing but hesitant. She found the woman's gaze, hovering by her table, a soft smile gracing her lips. Oh, that smile. How she'd missed that smile.
Allison Cameron.
The questions forming in her mind were abundant - beginning but not voicing - she repressed them. Instead she returned her smile, realizing that Allison was waiting for her reply and concluding that everything else could wait, nodding towards the empty seat opposite her.
"It would seem it's your lucky day, then," Remy chirped, amusement laced in her words, "Long time no see."
"Indeed it is," but she made no acknowledgment to her unexpected appearance, nor her sudden disappearance some six months prior, simply taking up Remy's silent offer of the empty seat.
"Does House know you're back?"
Cameron knew that wasn't what Remy was really asking, furrowed eyebrows hinting at confusion, questioning eyes betraying the care-free demeanour she was all too used to constructing.
The last time they'd spoken Allison had promised her that this façade was futile, that it wasn't necessary, because the wall Remy had built around herself was designed to block out pain that Allison never intended on inflicting.
Unforeseen broken promises had followed. It wasn't surprising that she'd returned to find those very walls repaired, rebuilt. Only faltering slightly under her gaze.
Guilt – something Cameron was so accustomed to it was now merely a familiar shadow, a constant companion. It washed over her now, reemerging under the brunette's downcast eyes, but once again it was repressed. Neither one yet willing to acknowledge the past; content to merely sit, to pretend as if nothing had changed.
"Knowing House, he would have known before I even decided to come," she was evading the real question, but, she concluded, it was only fair, since Thirteen refused to even voice it.
Stalemate.
Remy raised her eyebrows, a challenge of sorts. Your move.
"Y'know…" Allison trailed off; teeth grazing her bottom lip instinctively, a nervous habit that left Remy's eyes averted and stomach fluttering, "A normal conversation – a chat – it wouldn't kill us. Help pass the time."
Normally they'd settle into conversation easily, comfortably, quite content to chat about everything or nothing. Equally as happy in silence, their presence a comfort in itself. Now, however, it was apparent how much things had changed.
She would've been naïve to expect otherwise.
Remy took this moment to look at the woman sitting opposite her carefully, a face that seemed estranged from the familiar site she knew and – well, knew. It was subtle, admittedly, but she had spent so many months trying to get that face, that smile, out of her head that it had become all that she could see. She could never forget the way the corner of her mouth lifted, lips parted, a small chuckle escaping with a few blonde locks falling in front of her face. It wasn't surprising that Remy now noticed how the shadows under her eyes were a little more prominent that her usual sleep-deprived state (not uncommon for the head of an ER), how the lightness of her smile seemed to be more forced than reflective of joy or amusement, how her clothes hung off her slight frame and cheeks seemed hollow, as if another kind of exhaustion had clearly taken it's toll on the woman.
And then there was anger within herself, something Remy hadn't been expecting. The first month there had been nothing but anger, bitter betrayal seeping into her bones, into her very being. But, she reasoned, it had made her stronger. Proven that letting her walls down had been a mistake, that Allison's promise – which, of course, she had not forgotten – had been nothing more than words. Words Remy had been foolish to believe. Because how can you promise forever and then just leave the following day? No goodbye, no apology, no explanation. Six months of radio-silence had followed, leaving her to do nothing other than overthink; agonizing over every little detail of the few weeks they'd shared together. The conclusion she'd drawn was simply that it was just that – words. It had meant nothing, couldn't have done, not for Allison. And she'd been wrong to allow one woman to challenge all her beliefs, everything she'd built up to protect herself – she should have stood firm. Been stronger. It was all she'd learnt from a childhood like hers: self-preservation.
In Allison's presence those vulnerabilities resurfaced, she was well aware, and so with a small smirk and the clearing of her throat, she once again did all she really knew how to do – repress. Repress the anger, repress the pain, and repress the questions, which remained on the tip of her tongue, pushing to be voiced – repress it all. Cameron didn't ever need to know how much she'd affected her, how she'd managed to get under her skin, sneak her way into her life and then disappear, leaving a void of loneliness in her wake.
No, that would be her own little secret. She had a lot of those.
"Truth or dare?" Cameron's voice forced her to resurface from her musings, drew her back to the present.
Remy smirked. Allison raised her eyebrows. It was a challenge, Thirteen knew that. A peace offering of sorts – equal ground. A distraction, if nothing else.
"Oh, you don't want to do that, I'm the truth or dare queen."
"Well," Allison retorted, "I guess I've got quite the task on my hands, then, because I'm very not good at losing."