A/N: Set after season 2 but with a different outcome, they never brought in Shepherd, they didn't save all those lives. They lost. Enjoy. x

"While I was busy waging wars on myself, you were trying to stop the fight."

[Hate Me – Blue October]

This is Kurt Weller. I'm currently unable to take your call. Please leave your name, phone number and message and I will contact you as soon as possible. Thanks.

Jane drew in a shaky breath, staring down at the bag she had slung over her shoulder and fiddling with the cuticle on her left hand while pressing the phone to her ear with the right hand. She couldn't do this but she had to. For once she had to put his wellbeing before her own.

"Hey Kurt" she started slowly "I wanted to thank you. For everything you've ever done for me… For believing in me when I never could." Her voice broke and her eyes filled with tears, the lump in her throat growing thicker with every passing minute.

"I'm sorry I could never be that person that you saw in me."

They had never taken down Sandstorm. They had never caught neither Shepherd nor Roman. So many people had died. And it was all her fault.

The silence that descended over the office was deafening. There was no movement whatsoever, no one blinked or breathed or swallowed – they were frozen in place, some with their hands clasped over their eyes, some leaning against a wall for support, some sitting and some standing but all staring at the huge screen in front of them. The screen and the technology they had put all their hopes in.

They hadn't found Shepherd's stack of nuclear material in time and they couldn't find a way to stop the satellite from transmitting its signal.

The first person who shifted broke the spell. Suddenly there was movement everywhere. Some were breaking down now, not even the wall could support them in a moment like this. Some shook their heads, telling themselves that this couldn't have happened, that there was no way that could have happened – there silent 'no's grew louder with every one that left their lips.

Then there were those who had taken all of it in and still believed there could be something done - the dreamers – Patterson belonged to those who started furiously typing on her tablet even though her vision got blurrier the more tears rolled down her eyes. And some, like Tasha, tried to pull her away from the computers and into her arms because there was nothing that could be done anymore and they knew it.

There were the leaders, like Kurt, who everyone turned to now but he didn't have a command for them, he didn't have directions to give because what way can you go when your world had lost all control. Still, he tried to look as strong and resilient and solid as he could because he knew that that was what everyone else needed him to do and he would always put them before himself.

The believers saw and understood and didn't try to negate what had just happened but they felt betrayed by the higher power they had trusted in to make the world keep turning at the end of the day – and right now it felt like it would never spin again. Everything else was spinning instead. Reade had to sink to the floor as to not start staggering and possibly falling, even though – what was the point?

And there was Jane.

She saw and understood and didn't try to negate what just happened but she didn't feel betrayed. She knew there was nothing to be done and that trying would only waste valuable energies they needed to start the buildup one day. She wasn't a leader and no one turned to her but she still forced herself to keep her head up and to not tear her eyes from the scene in front of her.

Many of them lost all hope in this moment but no one lost it like Jane. She gave up, surrendered to whatever hell she had been placed in, quit hoping and abandoned everything she had ever believed in. She abandoned herself and left her body as an empty shell.

It was all her fault and she knew that she couldn't live with that knowledge, so she didn't.

She had stopped living that day and sunken deeper and deeper inside her own mind, but not to find a place where she felt save... she only went there to torture herself more, like she deserved to.

"I have to go" she whispered into the phone "I'm doing it for you" she broke off, trying to regain enough composure to speak but the next sentence still came out as a sob "Because I can't stand the thought of hurting you more every single day."

She dropped down on the bench she had walked up to, grateful that no one was around who could've asked her any questions about her state of mind. She's had too many questions like this in the past few weeks. Even if they didn't say it directly, she could see the way they were looking at her in pity - as if she deserved any.

"Jane! Stop this!" she heard Kurt shout and she thought she saw him enter her peripheral vision but everything was blurring in front of her and she wasn't sure. It didn't matter anyway, she simply kept going.

Jane continued hitting the punching bag dangling from the ceiling of the gym until two strong arms encircled hers, effectively keeping her from striking out at him, and pulled her back from her workout. Her eyes closed slowly, the room started spinning but she didn't want to drift off – sleep was even worse if it ever came.

"Jane" she heard the voice but it seemed so far away and she didn't have any strength to reach for it, it was all she could do to keep consciousness with her eyes closed. Someone pulled open her eyelids and suddenly it was so bright and she shut them again immediately.

She heard him talk to someone else – a woman? – but she couldn't follow their conversation. She felt someone touch her hands and somewhere in her brain she registered pain shooting through it but she didn't make a sound, didn't even blink. No pain could be worse than the one she had caused herself.

Suddenly she felt herself being lifted from the floor and tried to struggle out of the tight grasp that held her to someone's chest. She knew it was Kurt – it was always Kurt who carried her out of the gym these days – but she didn't want him to, so she tried fidgeting until he would have to let go – he never had let go of her, yet, and today was no exception. At some point she lost her strength and felt him pull her even closer to him. She drifted off.

When Jane woke again, she opened her eyes in reflex staring at the brightly lit ceiling unblinking, moving her head slightly to look at her bedside. Kurt and Patterson where kneeling next to the bed, bandaging her hand.

Kurt realized she was awake first but never let go of her hand "Your hand was bleeding" he explained needlessly, just to have something to say, "You didn't wear any gloves." It was a statement and an accusation.

"You always fight bare-knuckled in real life." was all she said to that. They'd had that argument almost every day, it was part of their daily routine.

"Okay, you're all done" Patterson said, raising from the ground, moving her hand to Jane's head to feel for her temperature and when she wasn't immediately worried about it she tucked a strand of the black hair behind her ear carefully. The blonde had tears in her eyes but Jane returned the look unblinking. "You have to look out for yourself" her voice quivered and Jane simply nodded because she had tried arguing and it got her nowhere.

"I'll leave you two to it" Patterson said after another moment turning around and placing a tray with foods and drinks on her nightstand before she left.

They were quiet after she had shut the door, Jane was staring up at the ceiling and Kurt was staring at her.

"You promised" he whispered hoarsely when he couldn't stand the silence anymore but she shook her head.

"I'm never going to promise anything anymore that I won't be able to keep. I never promised you this because there is no way I can keep it" she explained as softly as she could for his benefit. She had told him this for as long as she could remember and still he didn't seem to understand. He didn't reply to that, instead he reached out for the bottle of water on the tray Patterson had brought and unscrewed the lit.

"You need to drink something" he said holding the water bottle in front of her but she simply pressed her lips together, closing her eyes. "Jane" she heard him again, more forcefully and felt the mattress shift when he sat down next to her. Like always he put the bottle back on the nightstand and lifted her head and upper body up until she was leaning against him in a sitting position.

"Drink" he said again, a soft demand and she opened her dry mouth to let him trickle a few drops of the liquid in her mouth. She swallowed and they repeated that process four times until she wouldn't open her mouth for him anymore and he let it go for now. "We brought you a yoghurt."

"I'm not hungry."

"I know, but I don't care. You're going to eat it" he replied, pushing the yoghurt pot into her bandaged hand and the small spoon in the other. "You need your strength if we want to get justice. If we want to find Shepherd and Roman."

She stared at him as she took the first spoonful yoghurt into her mouth and swallowed "We haven't found them yet. Not even a trace" she said quietly, her voice feeling a little less hoarse after the water "We're not going to find her and even if we did" she looked him square in the eyes "It wouldn't change anything. There's no making this right."

She knew he remembered those words and she could only imagine how it must hurt to have them thrown back at him but she couldn't be bothered to think about that, it was the truth after all, and the truth usually hurt – she had learned that the hard way.

"We will get revenge" he whispered, watching her eat the yoghurt intently.

"But what's the point?"

"The point is" he replied angrily when she had put down the food, having eaten only half of it "That you're not you anymore. I'm going to find them and we're going to make them pay for everything they've done – for everyone they killed" she saw tears spring to his eyes "Including you."

If she'd had more strength she would have pushed herself up from the bed, away from him and would've glared at him. As it was she could only shake her head and raise her voice to more than a mutter "Don't you see? This is all my fault! I don't deserve to live!"

Jane had her left hand clenched into a fist and was clawing her fingernails in her flesh. She watched the blood leave a few parts of her skin, how it got white and lifeless and cold – just like she felt. There were scars marring every inch of her body and she was glad that right now she could only see the ones on her lower arm and hand.

She hated them and she hated her body and she hated herself. But she had to hate herself elsewhere because as it was she was only hurting more people.

"I want you to smile again" she whispered into the phone, unclenching and clenching her fist again "I want you to look forward in life and not spend all of your time waiting for my next break down."

They came as infrequently as they were varying and kept him from doing his job or getting a good night's sleep most days.

"I want you to have hope again and there is no way you would ever have any if I'd stayed. You deserve happiness and love and someone whole. And I am broken beyond repair. It's not your job to go down that same road, I don't want that for you."

She never wanted to see him cry again. She never wanted to see him cry again because he couldn't help her and because he felt like should've done something differently. He shouldn't have to blame himself but as long as she stayed, he always would.

Her throat felt tight, she couldn't swallow the spit accumulating in her mouth and she couldn't get the air down that her lungs were so desperately screaming for. She couldn't move. It felt like she had been strapped to some sort of desk, with her arms and legs tied to either side of her with no hope of getting out.

There was slight somewhere and she wanted to open her eyes to see where she was but for some reason she couldn't move her eye lids, they were too heavy. Her head had been secured as well and she couldn't turn it.

The only sensory perception she had left was smelling. She tried to take in the scent around her to find out where she was being held but before her brain could process the new impressions, she heard something and her attention flew to the noise at once. A door had been opened and someone had stepped in.

Again she tried opening her eyes and to her surprise they flew open at once. She wished she could just unsee what she had seen then.

"Welcome back, Remi" her mother smiled at her, Roman standing behind her, simply staring at her.

"My name is Jane" she managed to cough out, her throat feeling like it was on fire and her lungs still not able to fill with air but for some reason she still wouldn't die.

"Right" Keaton stepped into her sight all of the sudden and grinned at her, the same grin that he had always sported, and he had his favorite knife with him. The knife that had already left three bigger scars on her stomach that would never truly heal. "That was the name she always gave me. So she's still hung up on that."

"She told me that she was Taylor."

"Kurt." She choked out his name, trying to reach for him but his gaze was icy and he wouldn't take another step towards her.

"See, Remi" Shepherd smiled at her coolly "You don't just go around, choosing who you want to be now just because you feel like it."

"I'm Jane!" she cried out again, looking at Kurt, begging him with her eyes "Kurt, you know who I am. You know me."

He shook his head and Keaton started laughing. Her head shot to the other man who was eyeing her in amusement "But you remember being Remi, don't you?" he asked, coming closer, whetting his knife in the process "Don't you think if you remember her… maybe you are her?"

"I've changed" she whispered, trying to close her eyes but this time they wouldn't close just as they wouldn't open earlier.

"People don't change" Roman said with an evil grin "I've tried and it just doesn't work. You are never going to be anyone else but Remi, a monster who destroys every life she enters."

"All those people who died?" Kurt still wasn't stepping closer "They're on you. It's all your fault."

"Please" she begged, tears running down her face "Please don't hurt me."

Keaton was right next to her now "Oh, don't fear, darling. He'll just stand there and watch. We on the other hand…" he exchanged a gleeful look with Shepherd and Roman that made her stomach turn "We are going to be a little more active."

With that he raised the knife and drove it across her arm.

She screamed out in pain.

It was her own scream that woke her up and she felt her heart beat uncontrollably in her chest. Breathing heavily she tried to come back to reality, to take in her surroundings and when she did she felt and arm holding her in place, pressing her arms to either side of her body – just like she had been strapped to the table in her dream.

Only this time she knew he was doing it to keep her from lashing out in her sleep and hurting herself, or him, even though she doubted he had much concern for his own wellbeing. She tried turning around in his arms and after a while he loosened his grip on her just a little and she could look at him.

He looked tired and tormented, even in his sleep. She traced the stubble that was slowly becoming a beard because he didn't cut it as regularly anymore and when she did she saw his tear stained cheek. Trying to wipe it away with her finger she could feel that it was still damp, just like the shoulder of her shirt, as she realized now that he must have cried silently.

She felt him stir awake slowly and tried to sooth him bed to sleep but that hadn't worked anymore for a long time. He was always on alert around her and probably even when she wasn't around him because he still worried about her. He always worried.

"You okay?" he mumbled, still half asleep, tightening his grip around her.

"Yeah" she replied hoarsely, feeling better talking when they couldn't see each other in the dark "Let's go back to sleep."

"I love you" he whispered before letting his eyes close again and she felt tears in her eyes when she buried her head in his chest in the hope of going back to sleep as well.

He always told her that he loved her. Every single day, at least four times. When they woke up, when they got to work, when they went to bed and when she woke up in the middle of the night. She had never said the words back even though they would be true and he needed to hear them. But she couldn't bind him to herself when there was not enough left of her to bind himself to – he would do it because he was stubborn and he loved her.

She took one last breath "I love you" she said, the steadiest sentence she had brought out today "And it's because I love you that I need you to hate me. I need you to hate me with the same force you always protected me. You have to hate me for everything you deserve that I could never give you."

She was crying when she said the last sentence "I will leave and you have to move on. Thank you. Goodbye, Kurt."

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