A/n: Strangely, Wash's death is very, very easily fixed. Like. Comically easy. So easy that it could be rapidly reversed in canon if the desire ever took the writers. Like….fixable in ONE scene, easy. So I could write that…

OR WE COULD HAVE A LONGER STORY THAT HAS POINTLESS DRAMA! Obviously, we must opt for the pointless drama. Let's start this ride, kiddies. Strap in. It's time to set the universe right. Short opening prologues for everyone!


Chapter: Limbo


Ash drifts lazily on the air around them, helplessly buffeted by the winds. Some catches in his hair, some on his clothes, the dull grey striking a poignant contrast with the black of his apparel. It's somehow suitable, the color drained from the world around him. Dull grays and bitter oranges as their new start, their home, smolders around them, rain attempting to tamp down on the destruction. It's partially successful, the smoke drifting lazily up to join the clouds above them. Oddly poetic, as if the world itself mourns their losses with them, attempts to clean what was once perfect. They've had deaths before but...not like this. This...feels like something else entirely. A loss of innocence, if he was feeling introspective.

His side screams in protest but he moves through the rubble, searches in vain for a face he knows he will not find, will never again have the pleasure of seeing. Dark eyes that will no longer flash, no longer fix on him with such determination, a muted affection and a very real camaraderie. There is nothing, the overturned rubble simply reveals more ash, more dirt, no sign of her passing. Fate cannot allow him even this, will not permit him to return the body of his dearest companion to the world she so loved. To her home.

Uncharacteristic as it is, he feels tears burn at his eyes as he settles on the ruined steps of Command. The building's collapsed in on itself, a desperate remain of the dreams they'd painstakingly erected over the years. A symbol of the life they'd shared, built together. Gone. She's gone. Lucas is gone. Everything's just….

It could have gone worse. So much worse. Somehow it's the dullest, most bittersweet sort of comfort he's ever offered himself. He closes his eyes against the images that unwillingly come to him as he stares out towards the wilds.

The bodies of Lucas' mercenaries line the streets, mingled seamlessly with the soldiers Wash trained, he'd trained, come to know, come to regard as family. Her kids, as Taylor had jokingly (they'd always assumed it was a joke, now he isn't so sure) referred to them. It leaves an all too familiar burning sensation in his gut, in his eyes, and he's suddenly grateful for the rain. Rubs fingers absently over the raw flesh of his wrists, the stinging sensation momentarily drawing his attention away from his morbid thoughts.

He shouldn't be here, would prefer anywhere else. It's too fresh, too rife with memories. If he turns, he'll see the past given form, he'll see Wash staring after him, remember insisting she stay behind, stay safe. He'll see the Shannon children, attempting to put on a brave face for their parents. He'll see their people, still clinging to hope, to the notion that their leaders are something greater than human, something capable of shielding them from the incoming storm. He'll see every one of his mistakes, painted with striking clarity, dancing across the canvas of memory, each of their voices haunting and entirely too real in his grief addled mind.

Because they'd failed on all accounts. She hadn't been safe, the Shannon's hadn't been safe, he couldn't protect his people. And if he turns, all he'll see is how it might have been different. How perhaps if he'd listened to her, permitted her to remain at his side, or that he stay here, stay with her, it all could have been so very, very different. And when he closes his eyes, he sees nothing but that, an endless stream of equations, simple changes so drastically altering the outcome.

It's a dangerous road to walk, one laden with endless scenarios and conclusions. What if he'd done this, what if they'd changed that? Endless and maddening. He reaches out a hand, rests it on the ruined railing of the stairs. Remembers how many times she'd stood there, staring down at her returning Commander, an amused smile involuntarily turning her features, banishing her irritation, when his laugh colored the air.

If he closes his eyes, he'll see her, crumpled before him, hair splayed across her shoulders, covering a face that had in life been beautiful. He'll see nothing but his dearest companions stripped from him, stripped of the gravitas she'd effortlessly laid claim to. He'll see nothing but his failures played over and over, ream after ream, loop after loop.

He'll see her.

His Lieutenant, his friend, his companion, his Alicia.

He'll see her and it's somehow more maddening than this destruction around him.

Taylor manages to stand, clasps a hand to his side, vaguely notes that it comes away red with blood. He's overextended himself. He's no good to the colony dead; it's something his mind informs him of absently, and he notes with no small amusement that it's her voice that presents the notion. Soothing as it breaks over his frayed nerves, the shattered remains of his psyche. He needs to rest, to sleep, rid himself of this.

Knows he'll see nothing but her.

There's nothing for it. There's no sleep, nothing but the search. He continues to move through the rubble, another shadow drifting amidst the ash, a shade seeking completion it will never find. Searching, hopelessly, vainly for dark hair amidst a rapidly darkening landscape.

Searching, because somehow, someway, he can't bring himself to admit she's gone.

He feels a hand clasp on his shoulder, the fingers digging hard enough to drag him away from his bitter reverie. Jim Shannon stares back at him, the humor, every bit of well intentioned mirth stolen away from his green blue eyes. There is nothing there, simply determination. The same refusal to accept the harsh truth presented him.

The sheriff of Terra Nova moves in beside him, turns over a large boulder. Assists his Commander in moving a particularly impressive bit of rubble. Neither call out, neither speaks. Simply move through the ashes of their home, seeking, searching.

The tags beneath his shirt offer a comforting weight. He absently reaches a hand up to clasp them through the material. Two sets. His and Wash's. For luck, she'd said, quickly shoving them in his hand, before he could protest of she could think better of it, a smile entirely lacking mirth plaguing her features as he prepared to leave her what seems like an eternity ago. Spoken with the not so subtle warning that they be brought back to her. That he come back to her.

He'll find her. He'll scour the entire damn colony, the planet, heaven or hell, and let god save whatever stands between, but he'll find her. Her tags bounce against his chest, a piece of her. He moves through the rubble, a look of absolute determination tearing at his features, his ash stained face, his mournfully black clothes.

He'll find her.


There's only pain, a dull throbbing sensation in the back of her skull that insists if she's not dead she's most assuredly skirting the line. Conscious thought is impossible, everything torn from her, the word hazy and swimming in front of unsteady vision. Blinks. Grey to black, grey to black, open, closed, open. The vague sensation of liquid (blood, her mind supplies unsteadily) trickling down the side of her face, the bridge of her nose.

Tries to move her hand and finds it's impossible. Not restrained, not anything, she feels nothing over her hands, nothing keeping her immobile. Simply can't move. The thick haze, the blanket over her senses…pain or drug induced, perhaps both. It is, she decides, the strangest sort of feeling, being trapped in one's own body. Not at all pleasant.

Blacks and grays and movement that make her nauseous if she focuses on too long. Strange shapes moving in and out of her line of sight. Words she cannot, for the life of her, give meaning to. It's all a blur, nothingness brushing against her maltreated senses.

She's dead, can only be dead. Remembers dying. Remembers the gun, remembers falling, the cold of the earth beneath her. How her home had somehow become her tomb. How he'd never come for her. How despite all her foolish hopes, all those dreams where he'd rush from the tree line to deliver her, she'd stood alone at the end of things. Alone in life, alone in death; terribly fitting, if she does so say. She'd laugh, if it wouldn't hurt so terribly, if she was capable of coaxing her body to accept such a movement.

She's dead. It's as much a prayer as it is a simple statement of fact. Let it be over. She's done with this shit, plain and simple. She's made her peace; she's ready to move on to whatever the hell comes after. Heaven or hell, she's ready for a change in terrain.

But there's nothing, no light, only the pain in her skull, the pain wracking her nerves. The sensation of being trapped; the feeling of fingers ghosting down her neck, clasping in her hair. Dull and grey, an echo of things that had once been vivid. She's dead, must be dead.

Through the grey she see's pinpricks of blue, cold, familiar and yet something entirely different. Blue that should offer her comfort, that ought to summon familiar feelings of warmth, belonging; blue that's almost as much a part of her as the color of her hair or the memories she wraps around her like a cocoon as she sleeps.

She's lying on her side, hair splayed out over her forehead, across the floor. Something unyielding beneath her, cold like stone. Her ribs ache as if she's been struck with a high impact force, as if a booted foot has connected with them one too many times. Her body refuses to react to her commands, unable to make contact with her brain. She simply watches, blue eyes staring right back at her, twinkling with some strange unknowable light, flickering between emotions more quickly than they can effectively register.

Their master kneels beside her, turns her to lie on her back. Leaves her staring up into the nothingness above her; perhaps a starless night, perhaps a canopy, perhaps the inside of a cave. The blue eyes are over her, staring down, fingers brushing against her cheek, tucking a stray bit of hair behind her ear. Whispers in her ear, scratching against her consciousness, tearing fingers down her awareness, dragging her screaming back to the reality of the world. Fingers down her neck, clasping there. A forehead against hers, blue eyes so close, so terribly close. Fingers brushing over her cheek, smearing a bit of blood across her lips, the acrid taste burning.

She's dead, she's dead, she's dead… Tries to move, cannot.

A ghostly whisper, only just rasping through his throat, over parched lips, dancing in half mad eyes, twisted by loathing and hated too deep seated to possibly pass itself off as sane. Fingers, trailing over the planes of her features, blue eyes burning in the darkness, caressing like a lover long forgotten, no longer desired.

"Welcome back, Lieutenant. Would hate to see you leaving us so soon."

She's dead, she's dead, she's dead…

Opens her mouth to protest, tries to open her mouth. Nothing, no reaction, lips glued shut, body unmoving. The face so close to hers, smirking. Tries to move her arms to shove him away. No reaction.

There's only blue eyes, glittering in the darkness, whispered words slinking over her, fingers at her throat, only the pain coursing over her as she lies trapped in her own body.

She's dead, she's dead, has to be dead…

She isn't dead.