Title: Of Bets and First Impressions

Prompt: Rain

Pairing/Characters: Lincoln, AltLivia, Charlie

A/N: Last time, I swore these weren't all going to be henry!fics. This time, I'm promising that not all of the fics are going to be from Lincoln's POV. Anyways, hope you're all enjoying the fics! This one's set a few years before we meet the alt!team As always, R&R!

Oh, and clearly, Fringe is not mine. (In this universe or otherwise.)

Also- this one is a little darker than the other ones… Just a warning.

It takes Broyles less than two days to find a replacement for Shane Wilkes.

At 19:36 on Tuesday night, Lincoln watches as the amber he'd released solidifies around his partner and ends his life.

At 22:00 he finishes his shift and heads to the bar; it's well into Wednesday before Charlie finds him passed out on a park bench outside his building.

At 8:00 on Wednesday morning, he calls in sick.

By noon, he's sitting in the back row of a church paying his respects to a man who, just yesterday qualified as his best friend. By the time he approaches the empty casket to say his final goodbye, he's already become so much more than that.

He's the first man Lincoln's ever lost on his watch, and he knows he'll never forget him.

At 7:30 Thursday morning, he walks into Fringe Division HQ and she's already there.

Her badge is already hanging from her jacket, and her standard-issue pulse gun is holstered at her hip. Her dark blonde hair is pulled up into a tight ponytail, and she's sitting on top of Shane's desk like she owns it with a cocky smirk tugging at the corners of her mouth.

"Olivia Dunham," she says, sticking out her hand as he walks past her, "You must be Agent Lee."

He walks past her without a word and doesn't speak to her for the rest of the week.

And that's pretty much the way her first month with Fringe Division goes.

She's there every morning at 7:30 and refuses to leave until the day's work is done. She's good at her job, and he hears through the grapevine that the Secretary himself handpicked for the job. He learns to respect her as an agent- everyone does. But aside from clipped case related discussions, and barked orders, he doesn't speak to her.

Never mind the fact that he's her supervising officer, and it's a pain to have to find an interloper every time he needs to relay even the smallest piece of information; it's worth it.

"Class Four Event, gravitational degradation reported and radiation levels are being measured at nearly six times the fatal dosage. Quarantine recommendation is pending from HQ."

It's nine in the morning on a Tuesday thirty-five days after she appeared on Liberty Island. He knows it's her first serious Fringe Event with the department, and as a professional courtesy he'd sent Charlie to rebrief her on protocol before they'd left; the very last thing he needed was his rookie freezing out there this morning.

When the transport pulls up to the police boundary, it's pouring rain out. The water adds an extra layer of confusion to an already-hysterical atmosphere, and he can feel the panic even from within the van. He's tries not to let it get to him, but the memories from the last major event he'd worked are still raw, and he can already feel his pulse racing.

He's fairly sure he's alone in his panic. Someone from the outside pulls the van door open, and he watches as his agents- each looking more stoic than the last- descends into the madness. And then he sees her, and she looks absolutely petrified. In the month that she's been working under him, he's never seen her wearing anything other than a variation on her trademark cocky smirk, and it's a little unnerving to see the fear so plainly displayed on her face. But he'd never let her know that, so when she glances at him for just a second before she too descends into the hysteria, he offers no words of advice. He just turns to Charlie and whispers "I'll bet you fifty bucks I have her resignation by the end of the day," slight louder than he needs to.

Just before she jumps out, she whips around- any angriest version of her usual smirk firmly etched onto her face- and spits out something that sounds a lot like "I'll take that bet."

The storm complicates their usual procedure, but thunderstorm and all it only takes him five minutes to reclassify this event as a vortex and officially initiate quarantine protocol.

As group leader, it's his job to physically release the amber, and it's his least favorite part of the job; it's the kind of thing that no type of protocol or words of advice can help with. It's taken him almost two and a half years, and he's just figuring out for himself which little things make it easier. He's always been a little bit of an emotional guy; blocking that part of himself out is usually the most helpful,

He's usually pretty good at it.

The vortex originated in a picnic house in the middle of a State Park, and that's where he is now. He can hear the panic and the tears and he chaos outside the building, but within its four stone walls, there's only silence.

The first real sound comes from the metal dispenser hitting the concrete, and the second is the sickeningly familiar countdown.

Quarantine device unlocked. Warning: Massive loss of life will result.

The third is a whimper, and Lincoln's half-way out the door when he hears it. Protocol says he should get the hell out of there, but he looks back anyways. He knows he made a mistake when he sees the little boy caught underneath a table on the other side of the room.

It's the same way Shane died- stuck- and even though he knows that it's a good as suicide, he walks back into the room, the countdown blinking and flashing and opposing his every step.

Sixty seconds.

He reaches the table, and sees that it's fallen across the boy's chest. At least three of his ribs are broken, and if his labored breathing is any indication, one of them probably punctured his lung.

Fifty seconds.

He wants to move the table off the boy, but he has no idea what kind of internal injuries he has. He tries to shake him, but he won't respond. He won't move. He won't talk. He won't look at him.

Forty seconds.

He won't breathe.

Thirty seconds.

Lincoln can't move. He knows without a doubt that every second he spends kneeling in front of this dead child exponentially increases his chances of dying; but by this point, he's already resigned himself to death.

Twenty seconds.

He feels a hand on his elbow, pulling him to his feet and dragging him across the room. Before he can even truly comprehend what's going on, he's out of building and they're running.

Zero seconds. Detonating now.

He can see the quarantine line in front of him, and just as the countdown ends and the amber-gas begins to seep into the atmosphere, he's pulled through it.

He ends up in a heap on the ground, directly on top of whoever had just saved his life.

He expects it to be Charlie; but the body underneath his is softer than he thinks Charlie's would be, and smaller, and warmer and smells like mango.

He lies on top of her for a good five seconds before the adrenaline in his brain's dissipated enough to allow for conscious thought.

The very first thing he thinks it that Olivia Dunham just saved his life.

The second is that he's lying on top of her.

The third is that he owes her fifty bucks.

A/N 2: I'm honestly not sure about this one… In theory, I like it a lot. In reality though… I'm more meh-ish. I went back and forth between them getting along right off the back, and having to work at it, and eventually I decided on this…

Agree? Disagree?