Five Times Nick Said Goodbye to His Mother (again)
I know it seems like I'm slightly anti-Kelly Burkhardt, but the way I figure it there are precious few explanations that don't put her choosing to be a Grimm above her being a mother. There's one that not all bad.
His mother was alive.
As he called in Kimura's death those words kept echoing in his mind.
His mother was alive.
As he watched Rosalee and Monroe concocted an antidote for Juliette those words struggled to break free from his mouth.
His mother was alive.
As he listened to the boy who grieved for his lost parents, the man who still had nightmares, and the cop who investigated their supposed murders those words set his instincts on cautious edge more than anything else he'd encountered since his Aunt died.
Even with Juliette's herbalist inspired "miraculous" recovery, her white blood cell count was so low that the doctors wanted to keep her overnight and Nick just couldn't go home to an empty house. He found himself at Monroe's.
Some how over the past few months it has become Monroe he goes to when he wants someone to talk to. It is hassling Monroe for coffee that stars his morning off right. And it is the sound of too many tickling clocks that sooths his often-anxious heart.
Nick tries hard not to think too much about why this is
Monroe seems to always know just what Nick needs. Fresh coffee in the morning, dinners sometimes at night when he was hungry, and now a hawthorn, lavender, and basil tea that Monroe swore his great grandmother used to relieve stress, sooth bodies, and settle minds.
Nick tries hard not to think too much about how Monroe always knows what he needs.
After the stress of the case and Juliette and everything Nick finds himself drifting off to the sound of Monroe's voice telling him the historical background of Adalind's gift.
Nick tries hard not to think too much about how stretched out on Monroe's surprisingly comfortable couch he feels safer than he has in his own house in ages.
Eyes twitching, Nick tosses and turns as he falls into dreams.
Nick is overjoyed to have his mother back. He thought she was dead and the little boy inside wants to hold her close and never let her go.
And so he does.
He shows her his house (look Mommy, I'm a big boy!) and introduces her to Juliette (look Mommy, she's my friend!). He doesn't show her the precinct and she doesn't meet Monroe, even though he wants to.
Nick is overjoyed to have his mother back. He and Monroe share a lot but at the end of the day Monroe's a blutbad and he's a Grimm and that means there are just some things that Monroe just doesn't know and the books have never written down for fear of being obtained by reapers.
They talk about history and they talk about what it means to be a Grimm (you know who the bad ones are Nicky) and exchange war stories. Blame it on his cop experience but Nick starts to hear the words his mother isn't saying. His Grimm senses have been helping him with cop work almost since he came into them, but his cop senses give him a bit different look at his mother's words.
There is definitely something she isn't telling him.
It doesn't surprise him when she starts drawing her stories towards affiliation and honor. His mother talks of the greater good, of showing wesen their place, and of the glory of serving a royal.
All Nick can think of is all of his friends whose heads he'd like to keep attached to their bodies.
Nick's mother talks about the power of alliance and the differences in the seven royal houses. Nick's mother talks about what how the Grimm are helping the royals to keep the threat controlled and how doing so is a Grimm's blessing and duty. Nick's mother makes Grimms sound worse than Monroe ever has...mindless killing machines that need a code to keep them on the right path.
Nick's mother talk and talks and talks but he doesn't commit. He sees his mother grow a bit more desperate as he continues to reject her overtures and Nick can see the strain in her eyes as he remains stubborn—but that doesn't make him any more likely to give in and lose his independence.
Nick's mother claims she'll always love him and she can be both a Grimm and his mother as he says goodbye.
But then he thinks of the steinalder and the Grimm and the lead box with the fox imprint and wonders if she already has made her choice.
There are scars he doesn't recognize on his mother when they finally meet up again. It's been a week and he feels like his house is finally back in order when she seems to emerge from the mist.
He makes her a cup of tea (lemon, no milk burned into his memory by loss) and wonders where to begin.
The story she tells is almost believable in its unbelievableness.
Yes, there was an accident.
Yes, his father did die.
Yes, she had been in recovery for a very long time.
And that's when it gets weird. When she was better Aunt Marie and her Nicky were nowhere to be found.
The tones his mother speaks about Aunt Marie with hurts deep inside places that haven't healed from Aunt Marie's death. Speaks about how she that she had fallen in love with that ridiculous steinalder. Speaks about how she never had the taste to be a full Grimm. Speaks about she never thought someone who took after weak old Uncle Edvard would steal him away.
To this day Aunt Marie is one of the toughest people he's known and so he listens like he learned in the Academy and lets her draw her thoughts out. He goes with the flow and waits to hear what next illusion will be stripped away.
And then she's telling him about returning to the fold; about how he can be properly trained now; and about how soon all the wesen will fear his name like the good Grimm he is. She heard about the message he sent to the reapers and is beyond pleased to see that he has the right attitude.
When Nick tells her that his place is here and that he's a Detective first, his mother bats her hand in the air like she's trying to brush aside his concerns and tries again.
She changes tactics and asks about Aunt Marie's trailer. By now he's not sure which way is up so he pretends he has no clue. His mother believes him and he sees that they've just become strangers connected by DNA.
He stands his ground but promises to reconsider and she pats him on the check and tells him she'll be back to check on him as they say goodbye.
They both know they are lying.
A few days after she's left again Nick's mind returns to the movie by Edvard Grimm talking about innocent wesen and wonders if perhaps his Aunt would have understood his life as a Grimm more than he thought—and, in the deep recesses of night, wonders if maybe it was right for her to take him and run.
The thing about reapers is that they never stop coming.
He's in the hospital checking on Juliette when he ends up stabbing one disguised as a nurse with a nearby scalpel. He's at home cleaning up the mess when he dispatches one with a fire poker. He's at the station when one walks right in the door and gets out his scythe—he shoots that one in the shoulder but the reaper kills himself before they get a chance to question him.
The Captain is more upset than he's seen him, well, ever.
Juliette is talking about staying with her mother for a while.
Hank is wondering just whom Nick offended in a former life—even amongst homicide detectives Nick seems to have a bright red bulls eye painted on him.
After another death while Nick picked up some Voodoo Doughnuts (turns out a cardboard box filled with doughnuts can be an effective weapon), Monroe demands that Nick stay with him until this storm blows over. Nick hates that Monroe is putting himself in danger but does agree that he's safer there than at his cold empty house.
If there is one good thing the increased reaper presence has brought it's that the wesen in the little hamlet of Portland are becoming increasingly comfortable with him.
Nick would have thought that seeing him kill so many of their brethren would have had the opposite result but, as always, Monroe explains it with ease. Turns out most wesen don't like the reapers. They are seen as the underworld of their hidden world. Turns out the reapers have started to occupy the same horrible place in wesen bedtime stories as the Grimms.
The wesen that respect strength and power see their own personal Grimm dispatch more and more reapers and see that he is someone not to cross.
The wesen that want a quiet life worry about losing their mostly law-abiding Grimm detective.
All the wesen begin to realize just how good they have it under this Grimm. He won't chop off their head for sport or just because they exist. He's not a mindless enforcer from one of the royal houses. And, as long as you don't break the law, if you leave him alone he'll leave you alone. No one wants to lose that.
Nick is shocked when people start stopping by Monroe's house. Sometimes it's to bring over fresh food (Bud's wife Phoebe does make the best pies), sometimes it's to stand guard for a while (Monroe refuses to sleep when Nick is sleeping as he keeps watch. Monroe has already lost Hap, he won't lose Nick too), and sometimes it's to bring in some gossip or information about reapers coming to town.
Ten reapers later his mother resurfaces. Those reapers have been taken out by Nick, the Captain, Monroe, and one—shockingly—by Frank Rabe.
It's Monday night and Monroe is shaking him awake saying his mother is coming, Nick might be known to the iwesen/i in the area but this unknown Grimm sends everyone else scurrying.
His mother walks right in and has the most peculiar look on her face as she sees the blutbad protecting her son.
Shakes her head as if to clear it and tells him they are coming for him.
If they were Vikings the following battle would be a ballad. It's five reapers against the three of them. All of them are strong, fast, and dangerous. There is a damonfeur, a hasslich, a lausenschlange, a mordstier, and a skalenzahne. It's fire and brimstone. It's poison and crushing strength. It's hard and rough and just when they think they've won the lausenschlange lunges with his dying breath with his scythe and his mother jumps in the way.
"I love you Nicky, never forget that."
He holds her as she bleeds out and kisses her forehead goodbye.
The reapers stop.
Apparently killing twenty-one in relatively rapid succession earns you a bit of fear and caution and a word that resources might be better spent elsewhere. Nick catches the Captain starring at him one day during a press conference talking about a new path to unity, peace, and prosperity and Nick worries about what he did to be so interesting to him.
Grimms have a natural resistance to the Coins of Zakynthos but that doesn't mean that can't be ensnared.
Since he realized his mother was alive he's been running over past interactions and remembers that steinalder Farley Kolt—and his reference to being in town due to a Grimm.
He wants to believe that his mother is here to see him.. That she came only to save him because she was worried about him. That she had been keeping tabs on him and worried about Akira Kimura. And yet, it breaks his heart but his gut is uncomfortable with this.
Nick has learned to listen to his instincts.
It was his instincts that told him to trust Monroe far before he really should have. It was instinct that helped him save that seltenvogel. And it was instinct that made him want to help the eisbiber stand strong on their own. His instincts have made him a better cop—and a better Grimm. And he knows better than to ignore them.
Still, he enjoys having his mother back for as long as he can.
He introduces his mother to Juliette and Hank and watches her smile never reach her eyes. He shows his mother his house, the place where he has dug in for the long haul and he wonders if she can tell that the pie he's serving her is from the eisbiber or if she just doesn't think he should be setting down roots.
Monroe is special to him and his mother seems like an old-school traditional Grimm. So he warn him and Rosalee, Roddy, the Rabes, the eisbiber, and pretty much all the wesen in his area that there is a more traditional Grimm in town. He wants to introduce his mother to Monroe, but he's afraid that a meeting like that will end with someone's head on a stake.
When over a cup of tea, his mother asks about the Coins and says she just wants them to be safe. Nick reassures her they are and changes the subject.
When he comes home early from work to surprise her with dinner and finds the house pulled apart, Nick tells her he believes her when she said she lost her phone.
But when she starts looking more like an addict coming down from a high and begging him if he loves her at all to give her the Coins, he removes her hands from his face and very carefully tells her he loves her and that it's time for them to say goodbye.
She still knocks him unconscious before leaving and he swears as the world goes dark she kisses him and apologizes.
Monroe's is the first place he goes when he finds out his mother is still alive. And he's shocked by the fear that flashes across Monroe's face when he finds out that Kelly Burkhardt nee Kessler is still alive.
Turns out Kelly Kessler is somewhat of a legend even amongst the legendary Grimms—she's bloodier, faster, and more ruthless than most.
Monroe is almost shaking as his eyes dart to back and forth from Nick to the ground. Monroe hesitates and this—more than anything else—worries Nick. Monroe rarely hesitates when it comes to him.
When his voice goes low and fast, the story spills from his lips. It was Christmas when he was a teenager. It was one of his first hunts where he was old enough to hunt with the family pack. It was one of those beautiful days. Crisp mountain air, snow on the ground, and a bright blue sky. The kind of days where everything seems right with the world—of course, it wasn't.
The pack returned to the family homestead and found a scene that haunted Monroe to this day. His baby cousins, the youngest of whom was just four, beheaded. The house destroyed. Everyone was dead and their heads were on stakes.
It was Great Uncle Lou who provided the answer. He'd escaped Kelly Kessler several months earlier and it was her scent that was all over the house.
Nick doesn't quite know what to think. But it's a little girl with brown hair and Monroe's eyes that percolates at the back of his mind as he introduces her to Juliette and shows her the home he's built.
It's nice to have his mother back. She surprises him with cinnamon toast one morning, his favorite breakfast when he was twelve. They talk about being a Grimm and it's so relieving to find someone who understands the changes that have been coming over him.
Like Aunt Marie she advises him to leave Juliette and make himself more nomadic. But, there's a softness in her eyes that seems to say she won't mind if he doesn't and that she wouldn't mind some grand baby-Grimms.
Nick is so happy to see his mother that he ignores that feeling in his gut...the slightly sour acid that is a constant visitor these days. He thinks Monroe must have put the word out on the wesen gossip chain because he hasn't seen hid nor hair of a single one in days.
But, it's all too good to last.
It's a Friday night and his mother tells him she has a special surprise. The moon is full and they are going hunting. Says she wants to help train him up.
Nick's instincts are screaming at him now and they only get louder when Monroe isn't answering his texts.
Nick's blood turns cold when he finds Monroe tied to a tree.
"Mom, what's this?"
"Nicky, this is blutbad. I know you know that." His mother's tone is teasing, almost playful and its sets his teeth on edge.
"But, he hasn't done anything."
"Of course he has. He's a blutbad. We kill the bad ones Nicky."
"But he's not bad. He's my friend."
"Don't be foolish, blutbaden aren't friends."
"Mom, have you ever killed a little girl?" His mom looks up indigent at the horrible question.
"Of course I don't kill children Nicky, what kind of question is that?" this makes Nick feel a bit better. Maybe she was just part of team sent after Great Uncle Lou, maybe she didn't actually kill Monroe's baby cousin. It's not great news, but he can't quite believe the mother used to tuck him in at night, killed children on those business trips she used to go on.
"So there were other people when you went after Lou Monroe?"
"Lou? Oh you must mean Lewis Monroe. That was ages ago. No it was just me."
"But, there was little girl there, only four years old."
"Nicky I didn't kill any little girls. She was a just blutbad You know wesen aren't people." Nick's stomach drops and for the first time he realizes the sheer amount of trust his wesen have placed in him.
She hasn't quite picked up on his changed mood yet; hasn't quite seen his eyes as he realizes just who the "bad ones" are in this exchange. Monroe is tied up against a tree and has more bruises than Nick would like to see and Nick can't see a way words will get all of them out of this.
When she holds the crossbow up with an intention to shoot Monroe Nick doesn't hesitate and the following fight breaks his heart. He can tell she doesn't understand.
"He's a just a blutbad Nicky, he won't appreciate this. You are a Grimm you must embrace this."
In the end he jumps between a crossbow bolt intended for Monroe's neck (it hits his shoulder) but can't deflect the second shot to his heart. He shoots his mother in the shoulder.
He gets her handcuffed, calls for an ambulance and tears Monroe down from that tree.
Clutching Monroe close to him, he sees the life leave Monroe's eyes and it feels like his heart stops. Tears pool in Nick's eyes he turns to his utterly bewildered mother.
"That's a shame Mom, because there were some wesen I really wanted you to meet."
When he hears that she escaped from the holding cell he isn't surprised.
He surveys the empty holding cell and decides that this is where he will stand his ground. That he won't become his mother. That for every Geier there's an Eisbiber and that for every Hexebiest there is a Seltenvogel. He thinks of Charlotte who chose early aging over killing and Larry, Alan, and Dan who just wanted control.
This is his line.
This is his domain.
And for Monroe and Rosalee and Holly and Arnold and Bud and everyone like them he will stand and he will fight and there will be peace.
Si vis pacem, para bellum.
"Monroe."
Nick wakes up gasping with a start frantically looking around until he sees that Monroe is safe. He looks up and feels his heart stop pounding as he sees Monroe working on a clock at the dining room table. Monroe catches him looking and has a touchingly warm smile on his face.
They were all just dreams. Any of them could be the truth. None of them could be the truth. But, for once, his instinct is silent and Nick knows forewarned is forearmed.