Disclaimer: I don't own fringe or its characters and am not making any money off of this story.
They asked her about Fringe.
All the time. They asked about Peter, and Walter. They left her locked in that black cell and never let her see anyone or anything. The one time they physically tried to enter to question her, she threw a punch that left their agent reeling and to punish her they left her in the dark once again.
It became comfortable, after a while. She grew used to it easily. It didn't take long to figure out that Walernate was using it to scare her, so she acted the part when he'd come every now and then to lift the shade and gloat.
In the darkness, she'd practice. Concentrated hard and made things happen. Their trying to scare her is what gave her the idea. Walter had told her once that her being scared is what triggered her episodes in the past. So that is what she used. She looked deep, and she found something that scared the hell out of her.
And then one day, when Walternate opened that shade to look at her with that smirk of his, he opened the window to fire.
Alternate-Charlie helped her get back. She told him there was a cure for him on the other side and he found her an underground movement that was against the ZFT. They figured out what Bell had done and how to get her home. She took him with her. He barely survived, but she got him to her side.
She called Broyles first. She'd wanted to call Peter, but Broyles made more sense, especially with Charlie lying unconscious next to her. He sent her a team from Massive Dynamics and they got Charlie the care he needed. Got the larvae out so he could live.
As she watched the IV drip fluid into his blood, she spoke to Broyles about what she'd missed. Proved she was herself, how the switch had happened. What her double had done. He spoke to her of the past few months events, explained that the double had slipped into her life and taken it over. Her family, her job, everything. They hadn't had a clue.
She let anger seep through her bones as she asked, "Where are they?"
He didn't ask who she meant. Just handed her a set of keys for a car and gave her directions.
The tires squealed and smoked as she stopped. Peter, standing with Walter over a body, her double next to him, looked up in surprise as she ran over and slammed a fist into the woman's jaw. They fell to the ground in a heap and as Olivia rolled back, Peter stepped out a foot to crush the hand of Alternate-Olivia that had begun to reach for her gun.
"Took you long enough," he said, watching as Olivia reached back and threw another punch. Blood ran down the woman's nose as she glared up at them and then tried to get out of her grip as Olivia slid a pair of cuffs over the woman's wrists.
"Sorry if my timing disappoints you," Olivia said.
Peter grinned. "Are you kidding? You're timing is perfect, as always."
Later, after the agents came, after Alternate-Olivia was locked away ("Something with light, and a window," Olivia insisted), after the case was solved and people cured (skeletons were turning into a rubber like substance), and after everyone had been debriefed, Peter and Olivia sat on the couch at his house, the news playing in the background and one of Astrid's pies half eaten in front of them with a bottle next to it.
They sat close, but not too close. Talked of everything, but nothing important. Time had passed for them, so neither quite knew where they stood anymore.
They sat like that for hours until, finally, as the late night infomercials began to play, Olivia asked, "How did you know?"
Peter smiled at her. "How's the whiskey?" he asked, instead of answering her.
Olivia looked down at her drink. It was halfway gone, and her second for the night. "Its fine," she replied, confused.
"Where do you stash the bottle in your office?"
"Bottom drawer, left hand side of my desk."
"And your house?"
"Top shelf, above the fridge, behind my dishes. Why?"
Peter smirked and sipped his drink. "She wouldn't drink whiskey," he explained softly. "Couldn't even handle it the one time I got her to have some either."
Olivia smirked. "I don't know whether to be flattered or offended."
"Flattered, most definitely," Peter said, setting down his drink. He leaned back into the cushions and let his arm slip behind her, his fingertips resting at her neck. "I love a woman who can handle her jack."
Olivia smiled. "I'll keep that in mind."
"You should," Peter said. "But, there were other things too, besides the whiskey. Her walk wasn't right, her smile seemed wrong. She looked at Rachel like she was seeing a ghost and Ella like she didn't know who she was. I didn't say anything though, I was afraid I'd put you in danger."
"Well, I'm here now, so you don't have to worry anymore."
"I know," he replied. Leaning forward, he took her drink out of her hand and stopped short of her lips. Looking into her eyes that showed an unspoken question, he said softly, "I never touched her."
Olivia let slip a small sigh of relief, and pulled him closer for a kiss.
This was why she'd come back, she thought, as he leaned her back on the cushions and slid his fingers through her hair. This was why she'd fought.
The fear she'd used hadn't been of the dark, or of her captors. It wasn't of the unknown or what would happen to her. It was losing this, and Peter, before she'd ever really gotten a chance to have him.
But she was here now. He was hers. And this was why, even though she'd escaped, she would continue to fight.
Always.
A/N: I thought of this right after watching the season finale. It just kept sticking in my head about that dark cell and that burned out room from the video of Olivia as a kid. Haven't posted fic in general in awhile, and definitely nothing from Fringe. Hope you like it. Feel free to review.