Rating: K+
Spoilers: Yes. This is a post season three fic, so basically everything ever.
Disclaimer: All the really cool, recognizable things in this story belong to the lovely people who bring us Fringe. The embarrassing (and hopefully minimal) grammatical errors are all mine.

Author's Note: This is the first in what will most likely be an eight chapter story. I'm pretty far along in the writing so I shouldn't be making you wait too awful long for an update. In fact, this chapter is so short I think I'll try and upload Chapter 2 later today. Of course, comments and concrit are much appreciated but not by any means required.

Introduction: Surprises

Olivia Dunham has never liked surprises. She doesn't really understand why so many people enjoy being blindsided. Maybe, she supposes, their lives are frequently disrupted by unexpected bouts of happiness. It's quite nearly a foreign concept to her. Surprises for Olivia are things like meeting a better version of herself and watching a building full of people vanish into the ether. And "ether" is just a poetic way for Olivia to gloss over the fact that she was also surprised by the existence of an entire universe.

For someone who doesn't like surprises, Olivia Dunham has chosen a hell of a career path.

Part of her wonders why she doesn't relish every twist and turn or thrive on the adrenaline like her alternate seems to. Even in her own head it sounds like an odd notion, but Olivia thinks expecting the unexpected and excelling in the unknown would really suit her. Like it really should have been an aspect of her personality, but its chance to grow died with the people she's loved and the reality she tried so desperately to hold on to. Now Olivia's just too tired for any of that. Maybe she just needs someone to rekindle that quality in her, that thirst for knowledge.

Maybe she just needs someone.

And suddenly she's searching her pockets and her drawers and the coat hook that looks so empty without a coat. No, not empty exactly, but something much worse – wrong. Something is missing. Something besides a pea coat. Something is lost and it's just at the tip of her tongue, in dark corners of her normally brightly lit mind. She knows it's something terribly important because there's a tear rolling down her cheek unbidden and she feels like if she doesn't sort this out it will be waiting to surprise her, lurking behind all the obscured shadows that make up her life.

She's frantic and she doesn't understand and when it comes to her brilliantly compartmentalized emotions, Olivia Dunham always understands. She scrambles frenetically through her belongings and in her haste knocks down the picture Astrid snapped of herself and Walter on his birthday last month. She stills as she gazes at the shattered glass on her floor and realizes it's time for a deep breath. Possibly more than one. But a few deep breaths are all she needs because, really, she's fine. As she picks the photo out of the shards of glass, her eyes fall on the smiling face of Walter Bishop. The corner of her mouth lifts slightly as she is filled with the odd sort of affection she feels for the closest thing she'll ever have to a father figure; however, trepidation is bubbling just beneath the surface. She hasn't feared the man since childhood, that isn't the problem. The problem is their similarities, which are beginning to weigh heavily on her more every day. Like the fact that she's running through her house like a madman as if she of all people could simply forget something. (She's tried, but apparently eidetic memories are more often a curse than a blessing.)

She's got to stop having these episodes. She will remain in control because there are very few things Olivia Dunham, Super Soldier by creation and Gate Keeper by predetermination, values more than control.