the lovers left broken

by Becks Rylynn

'There is still a dead body lying in the bed. It's just awake.' (Otherwise known as the fic in which Demon!Dean is the Winter Soldier to Laurel's Captain America.)

4. FORGET THE DRAGON

AN: I'M A DAY LATE! I'M SO SORRY!

Additional warnings: Okay, so there are actually a few potentially triggering things that I feel the need to warn for in this chapter. One: This chapter briefly involves a character inducing vomiting, so if that's the kind of thing you're uncomfortable with, I'd advise you to skip the second scene in this chapter. Two: At the beginning of this chapter, there is a scene that borders on physical abuse, although the abuser does not know what they are doing and has no control over it. Three: Near the end there is a scene in which one character is fearful of the possibility of future sexual assault. Four: This is already tagged as a warning and everything but suicidal thoughts pops up a lot for one specific character.

Disclaimer: I own none of the characters you recognize.

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the lovers left broken

Written by Becks Rylynn

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Chapter Four

FORGET THE DRAGON

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If you knew what was going to happen, if you knew everything that was going to happen next - if you knew in advance the consequences of your own actions - you'd be doomed. You'd be ruined as God. You'd be a stone. You'd never eat or drink or laugh or get out of bed in the morning. You'd never love anyone, ever again. You'd never dare to.

MARGARET ATWOOD | THE BLIND ASSASSIN

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The last time she was in the bunker, she was getting better and Dean was getting worse. He was deteriorating, breaking apart, splintering and cracking slowly but steadily; barely sleeping, barely eating, and the part that made her want to scream was that no one was helping him.

Cas was gone, Sam was spiteful, Laurel was trying but she couldn't hold him up, and Dean was...

Well, Dean was dying.

She realizes that now.

At the time, she had thought she was just waiting for him to hit bottom and decide he wanted to be pulled from the fire. It was what had happened to her. She had hit bottom and was just beginning to claw her way back up and he had helped her. When the time came, she told herself, she would help him. She would pull him from the fire, hold him up in the water, stick her fingers down his throat to get him to vomit up the pills, yank the gun out of his mouth. She would do anything for him. But he had to want it first. That was just how these things worked. She hadn't known that it was already too late to save his life. There would be no pulling him from the fire.

He was already burning.

Her first full day in Kansas was spent simultaneously trying to patch up the relationship between Dean and Sam at least enough so that she could trust Sam with Dean's life again (not that she would ever tell him that she didn't, she felt bad enough just thinking it) and shield them from each other's bullshit. It didn't work. Sam wound up storming away from the dinner table - he sure did storm away a lot - and Dean went to bed early and without eating, kissing her on the side of the head and murmuring, ''You just keep tryin' to change the world, honey, don't worry about us.''

She was left alone at the table, mildly irritated and extremely disheartened.

When she crawled into bed, Dean was already asleep, passed out on his stomach, arms curled around his pillow. She swallowed a sigh of relief. Thank God. He hadn't gotten any sleep the night before. He had tossed and turned all night long, scratching at the Mark on his arm and waking her up regularly, until he finally gave up and got out of bed at four thirty. Instead of sleeping, she put her glasses on and cracked open the book she had been meaning to read, determined to watch over him. Just in case.

It didn't work.

She woke up at three in the morning with her book on her chest, her glasses still on, and alone. His side of the bed was empty.

Probably shouldn't have been surprised.

Eventually, after checking the kitchen, the library and the garage, she found him in the shooting range. In hindsight, because it was Dean, it probably should have been the first place she checked. He was standing there, calmly and methodically loading a gun. She hovered in the doorway, propped up against the wall, and watched him. He moved with a careful, cutting sort of precision that was meant to cover his exhaustion. He had been there for a long time.

She sighed. Well, hey. At least he was wearing proper eye and ear protection. She'd had to practically beg the boys to get with it when it came to that stuff. It was a miracle they both still had their hearing. Not using protection out in the field was one thing, but in a firing range with the echo and everything? Honestly, what would they do without her? They'd be well on their way to deafness, that's what.

Dean aimed at the target, finger poised on the trigger...and he didn't fire. He tilted his head to the side, narrowed his eyes, looking like he was just itching to pull the trigger, and then he let out a long, slow breath and put the gun down. He pulled off the glasses and slipped the muffs around his neck, staring down at the gun. ''Go back to sleep, Laur,'' his voice was hoarse. ''It's late.''

She pushed off the wall and took a few hesitant steps towards him. When he didn't move, didn't even look at her, she picked up her pace. ''If I wanted to go back to an empty bed, I'd go back to Starling,'' she said.

''Maybe you should.'' He took off the muffs and placed them over her ears before snatching up the goggles and placing them over his eyes. ''Can't imagine you're having much fun here.'' Without warning, he picked up the gun and fired. She jumped, startled, hands automatically going to her ears, clapping the muffs tighter over her ears. She resisted the urge to snap at him about protection, god, Dean, how many times do we have to have this conversation?

''I didn't come here to have fun,'' she said. ''I came here to be with you.''

He turned to face her for the first time, arching an eyebrow, tiny, fleeting smirk pulling at his lips. ''That's flattering.''

She was too busy staring at his red rimmed eyes to come up with a wittier comeback. ''You know what I mean.''

He let out a weary sigh and put the gun back down. He braced himself against the cubicle, eyes drifting shut for barely a second before they snapped open again like he had seen something behind his eyelids that he didn't want to see. He clenched his jaw.

Despite the fact that she knew precisely what his answer would be, she couldn't help but ask the question. ''Dean,'' she moved her hand to his back. ''Are you okay?''

''I'm fine,'' was his immediate, slightly snarled response.

She narrowed her eyes. Liar. She stared at his profile for a long moment, studying his jaw line and the curve of his nose, his eyelashes and his lips, and then, when he stood straight, she looked at his hands. All of the frustration that had been mounting disappeared, replaced by a very familiar, all consuming worry. ''Honey,'' she reached over to close her hands around his. ''Your hands are shaking.''

He didn't look at her. ''I'm tired.''

It was a half truth, at best. She had no doubt he was tired but that was far from the main issue here. The main issue was that ugly red thing on his arm that was changing him, draining him, warping him into something he didn't want to be, and slowly killing him from the inside out. She said, ''So go to sleep.''

He turned on her, quite viciously, shoving her hands away but grasping her wrists tightly before she could pull them away. His grip was uncomfortably tight, almost vice like, and she fought hard not to wince. There would be bruises, she knew that. She did her best not to react. She didn't gasp in fright or grimace in pain. He glared at her, stepping into her personal space, towering over her, still clutching her wrists. ''I can't sleep.'' There was a cold, hollow sort of anger gleaming in his eyes and a scowl playing on his lips. Vaguely homicidal would be one way to describe it. Absolutely positively not the man she fell in love with would be another.

The man grasping her wrists was not Dean Winchester. The man glaring down at her almost blankly was Cain.

Laurel often wondered if she would be able to protect herself from the supernatural world. She had done it before, but she had never done it alone. Dean was always there, right by her side. She wondered, constantly, if she was cornered by something, if she was alone, no Dean, no Sam, would she be able to protect herself? It was one of those random thoughts that popped into her head every now and then, usually if she was walking home late at night by herself, or if she heard a noise in her empty apartment while Dean was out of town and not lying in his usual spot in the bed, the spot closest to the door because yes, he was that guy. That night, for the first time, she wondered if she would be able to protect herself from Dean.

It was a truly devastating thought.

Calmly, without so much as a nervous intake of breath, she locked eyes with him and said, plainly, ''Let go of me.''

He did. Instantly.

There was a flicker of something, of warmth, in his eyes and then he realized what he was doing. The cold rage dissipated and he all but threw himself away from her, eyes widening in horror. He looked at her wrists. There was a painful second of silence and then, ''Laur.'' His voice sounded like there were rocks in his throat. ''Laurel...'' When his eyes flicked towards the gun, just briefly, she made her move, practically diving at it, snatching it up before he could. She didn't like the way he looked at that gun. Like it was a means to an end. She pressed the small button next to the trigger and pulled the magazine out, before gripping the slide, pointing the gun at the ground, and pulling it back. The bullet that was in the chamber fell to the ground noisily. She pulled back one more time just to make sure and then she put the gun back down, behind her, out of his reach. She hesitated a moment before she looked at him and immediately felt guilty for hesitating.

His eyes, which had been trained on the gun, met hers. She had opened her mouth to say something but the second she saw the look in his eyes, the words died in her throat. He looked terrified. She had only ever seen that amount of sheer terror in his eyes once before. She took a step toward him, but he darted back, holding a hand out in front of him to keep her at bay. ''Don't.''

She did as she was told, stopping in her tracks. ''Dean...''

''I-I didn't...'' He looked like he was going to throw up. He shook his head, forehead creased in a strange mixture of confusion, fear and grief. ''I didn't mean to...'' He trailed off and swallowed hard. ''I'm sorry.''

There was a lump in her throat. ''I know.''

''Did I hurt you?'' His voice was surprisingly level.

She shook her head. ''No.''

''You're lying.''

''I'm not.''

He didn't look convinced. He looked down at the Mark on his arm. He wasn't looking at her when he said, ''I'm sorry,'' but his voice cracked.

She couldn't stop herself. She rushed forward to wrap her arms around him. ''I know.'' She leaned up to press a kiss to his cheek, then his other cheek, then his forehead, and his nose. ''I know, baby. It's okay.'' She ran her fingers through his hair, speaking in low, soothing tones. ''I'm okay.'' His shoulders relaxed slightly and he wound his arms around her, returning the hug. He buried his face in the crook of her neck and let out a shaky breath. She pulled away from him first, still running her fingers through his hair comfortingly. She wanted to make it better for him. She wanted to make him better. She wanted to help him. He had helped her. He had stayed by her side while she was detoxing. He held her hair back for her when she couldn't keep her food down, wrapped her in blankets when she was shaking, stayed awake and watched her while she slept in case she choked on her own vomit or had a seizure in her sleep. She wanted to be able to help him like he helped her, like he was still helping her. But she couldn't. She couldn't help him with this. She wasn't entirely sure anyone could help him with this.

That didn't mean she wasn't going to try.

She offered him the biggest smile she could muster up and placed her hand on his cheek. He leaned into her touch like he was drowning and she was dry land, all long sighs and closed eyes. It was one of the things that never changed. Dean Winchester was eternally touch starved. He craved touch almost more than he craved alcohol and it was one addiction she was perfectly willing to indulge. Sure, five years of her hands on his body every chance they got didn't make up for the bad childhood, the decades of loneliness and the lack of tenderness, but that was okay. They would get there eventually.

She smiled at him again and tried to make it as bright and as cheerful as possible, like nothing was wrong, in an effort to alleviate the tension and the nearly tangible sorrow. ''You're getting scruffy again,'' she said lightly, gently raking her nails down the stubble on his cheek.

''You think I should grow it out again?'' He asked, with a half hearted smirk. He caught her hand before she could pull it away, suddenly, and she quickly managed to push back a flinch. He didn't notice, brushing his lips across her knuckles. She still got butterflies in her stomach whenever he did that.

''Well,'' she snaked her arms around his neck and pressed her body into his. ''You know how I feel about your beard.''

He laughed, or at least tried to, and pushed her glasses up on her nose. ''And you know how I feel about your glasses. I'll grow out my beard if you wear your glasses more often.''

''Hmmm. Tempting.'' She leaned up on her tiptoes and caught his lips in hers. She meant for it to be a sweet, chaste, almost teasing sort of kiss. Dean, apparently, had other ideas. When she started to pull away, he looped an arm around her waist and pulled her close, cupping her cheek with one hand and deepening the kiss. His hands felt their way to the hem of her shirt and slipped up, warm hands splayed across her bare skin. ''Hey, listen,'' she whispered, voice throaty, when he had to pull away to catch his breath. ''You know you're going to be okay, right?'' She rested her forehead against his, both of them breathless from the kiss. ''I know you,'' she said. ''I've lived with you for the past five years. You always make it out. You always survive. You can survive this.''

He didn't respond to that, but he did say, in this quiet raspy murmur, barely audible, noticeably trembling, ''Pretty bird, I love you.''

She thinks, now, that that might have been the moment she knew, somewhere in the back of her mind. It was certainly the moment he knew. Dean Winchester doesn't say 'I love you' unless he's saying goodbye. But that night, desperate to believe that he would be okay, that he would stay with her, that the mark on his arm wasn't slowly taking him away, she ignored the sadness settling into her bones and she kissed him.

And, you know, it's kind of funny.

She had been so preoccupied with the proper eye protection, the proper ear protection, so adamant that protection should always be used, and yet she never once - not when the kiss of comfort became something frenzied and desperate, not when her back hit the wall, not when he tugged down her underwear - gave any thought to any other kind of protection.

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In the days that pass, Dean's death becomes something of a ghost.

It follows her wherever she goes and refuses to leave her alone. Dean is the shadow in her empty bedroom at night; he is the unseen presence behind her at the Arrow penthouse, while she's visiting her father. He is the creaking floorboards at night, the constant ache in her chest, the hole in her heart, and he won't leave her be. He is that nagging voice in the back of her head, laughing, always laughing, asking, How much do you miss me, pretty bird?

The night of her father's heart attack, the night she begs him to come home, she goes back to her empty apartment and she digs out her safety net. In the back of her closet, in a box of Christmas decorations, there is a bottle of pinot noir, waiting for her to fail and come running. When she first decided to get sober, all of the alcohol was removed from her apartment. Except this one bottle. She got to it before Dean did, hiding it away where she knew he would never look. She hasn't looked at it since. It's just nice to know it's there. In case she needs it.

After Sara finally falls asleep on the couch, Laurel locks herself in her room, cracks open the bottle, and pours herself a glass.

She hesitates.

How much do you miss me, pretty bird? Dean asks.

Laurel drinks the wine. She polishes off two and a half glasses of the dark red liquid and is just starting a third, feeling not quite buzzed but getting there, when she thinks of the baby. It has taken her two and a half glasses of wine - and they're not particularly small glasses either - to even think of her baby. Isn't that pathetic? God, she's going to be a horrible mother. Her entire body goes cold and she practically slams the glass down onto her bedside table, so hard the deep red sloshes over the rim. Even though she knows, logically, that two glasses of wine most likely won't have that much of an adverse effect on her baby, she still panics. She does that from time to time. There is very little logic in panic.

She staggers out into the kitchen, fumbling around, clumsily pulling apart the pantry until she finds the box of table salt.

Once, when she was in college, there was a serial rapist on the loose in Starling City. He was targeting pretty brunettes around her age. Her father became rather obsessed with the case, paranoid that she was in danger. That was when she started going to self defense classes. He wanted her to be safe, so he taught her a few tricks. For if she ever suspected she had been roofied.

She mixes three tablespoons of salt with warm water, stirs it up quickly, just enough so that all the salt is dissolved, and then she pinches her nose and gulps it down.

''Laurel?''

Sara is standing in the doorway, rubbing her eyes. Laurel has flashbacks of seven year old Sara, standing in her bedroom doorway in the middle of the night, rubbing her eyes and clutching that stuffed shark to her chest. ''Laurel?'' She would whisper. ''Are you awake? I had a bad dream and there's a monster in my closet.''

Laurel would pull back the covers and say, ''C'mere, Sare-bear. There are no monsters here.''

''Sara,'' Laurel mumbles. She turns away from Sara and braces herself against the sink, squeezing her eyes shut. Well, great. Yet another humiliating moment witnessed by someone she loves. She licks her lips. Whatever. She doesn't really have the energy to think about that. There's still a bottle of wine sitting on her dresser and she needs it gone because if it's there when she gets back, she will drink it. She's always prided herself on her remarkable self control but that goes right out the window when alcohol is involved. That's what being an alcoholic is. ''Sara, I need you to go - '' She stops, gritting her teeth. She has about ten seconds of teeth clenching discomfort, just enough time to think about how this is definitely going on the list of her top five lowest moments, and then she's lurching forwards and vomiting salt water and red wine into the sink.

She hears Sara swear behind her. She is at Laurel's side in an instant, gathering her hair from her face and rubbing her back. She pretty much blatantly ignores the way Laurel tenses at the touch and starts to murmur something sweet and comforting, but then she sees the red. ''Oh, god, Laurel. Laurel, is that blood?'' When Laurel heaves again, bringing up more red wine, Sara's entire body goes absolutely rigid. ''Okay,'' she actually sounds scared. ''Okay, we need to get you to the hospital.''

''It's red wine,'' Laurel manages to croak out. ''There's - There's a bottle in my room. On my dresser.'' With the hand that isn't holding her hair back, she points blindly in the direction of her bedroom. ''I need you to get rid of it.''

Sara is quiet. Her hand falls away from her sister's back.

Laurel clears her throat, clenching her teeth and waiting for the next wave.

''Laurel,'' Sara says, lowly.

''Sara, please.'' Then she retches again. The please is probably what gets Sara to reluctantly leave her side. Laurel hovers over the sink, clutching the countertop so tightly her knuckles are white. She gags a few more times and then turns on the tap, splashing her face with cold water. She still doesn't move. When she's finally confident that she's not going to throw up again, she turns off the faucet and sinks to the ground. ''I'm sorry,'' she breathes out, placing a hand on her belly. ''I'm so sorry.'' She can feel her face crumple but she refuses to let herself cry. ''I'm trying,'' she says. ''I'm trying so hard.'' She doesn't know what else to say.

She leans her head back against the cupboard door and stares up at the ceiling. The bitter taste in her mouth is disgusting and her throat is raw. She no longer feels pleasantly buzzed or comfortably numb. She just feels guilty and sick and shaky from panic. ''Please be okay,'' she whispers. She lifts her eyes. ''Please...'' She trails off, lets out a sigh, and presses her lips together tightly. ''Please don't let me lose this one, too.'' She has no idea who she's talking to.

That's a lie. She knows exactly who she's talking to.

''I'm so sorry,'' she drops her gaze down to her stomach. ''I'm so sorry you won't get to meet him.''

She closes her eyes, licking her lips and trying to relax her body. She rubs her hand up and down her stomach softly. He would have been so happy. She knows that. He would have been terrified and nervous as hell, but he would have been happy. Excited, even. He was great with kids. He was so amazing with Danny de la Vega's son, Nate. He was a natural. He was basically a parent without a child the entire time she knew him. And the last time she was pregnant...

They wanted kids so badly.

''He was a good man,'' she whispers. ''Your dad. He was a hero. He saved the world. He saved the world a lot, actually.'' A strangled laugh escapes her lips. ''He saved so many people. Including me. He - He would have loved you. He would have loved you so much, baby.''

Life isn't fair. Life is, in fact, one shitfest after another. Don't let anyone tell you different.

When she opens her eyes, Sara is standing in front of her. ''It's gone.''

Laurel lets out a breath. She avoids the disappointed look in her sister's eyes. She doesn't need it. She gets it. She relapsed. She failed. She's pathetic. Whatever. It's over and done with. She can't change what just happened. When Sara hands her an ice cold bottle of water from the fridge, she accepts it gratefully. The cool liquid soothes her burning throat and washes away some of the bitter taste in her mouth. She sips at the water slowly and concentrates on breathing. Without a word, Sara takes a seat next to her on the floor. They don't talk for a few minutes. Laurel drinks her water. Sara watches her out of the corner of her eye. Finally, Laurel can't take the silence anymore. ''I am doing the best I can, Sara,'' she says, utterly exhausted. ''I swear.''

Sara softens. The disappointment and all of the things she clearly wanted to say drain out of her and her shoulders relax. Suddenly, she just looks...sorry. She looks so very sorry. She threads their fingers together and says, softly, ''I know.'' She leans in to press a gentle kiss to Laurel's cheek. ''Nobody's asking you to do anymore than that.''

Laurel clenches her teeth.

How much do you miss me? Dean asks.

More than you will ever know.

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Laurel tells her father about the baby the morning of her first doctor's appointment.

She doesn't plan on it. It just sort of slips out.

Her dad is still in the ICU. He's been scheduled for bypass surgery at the end of the week, he's doing as well as can be expected, and he's... He's still here. It's going to be a long recovery, and he's never going to be the same again, but he is going to make it. He has made that perfectly clear to his girls. He's not going to be a detective again. At least not out in the field. When he goes back to work, if he goes back to work, the most he will be doing is desk work. That is a cold, hard truth that all of them are still learning to accept. He hasn't even begun to accept it. He's still talking about ''getting back into fighting shape.'' Like that's an option.

The emotional aspect is easily the hardest part. He had massive internal bleeding, a blood clot, a heart attack, and he's going to have bypass surgery. Not to mention, his oldest daughter was kidnapped by a mad man, his youngest daughter went back to her former job as an assassin, and his - for all intents and purposes - son-in-law was murdered. So he has a lot on his plate. His mood differs from day to day. Most of the time, he's his stubborn self, determined to beat this, to be okay again; determined to make it. Some days are harder than others. He'll get angry and snap at everyone; the nurses, the doctors, his daughters. One time, he kicked Sara out of his room because she was being too cheerful. Another time, he yelled at Laurel because she was babying him.

Those days are getting more and more frequent as he continues to be cooped up in the hospital, kept out of the action, unable to do anything but sit there and think about how he almost died and how he'll never be the same. He's starting to push people away. Because he's scared.

Laurel understands this. She really, really, really does. You have no idea how much.

She will also admit that she and Sara could be handling this better. Sara is almost maniacal in her cheerfulness, praising every little thing he does with coos and forehead kisses, like he's a child learning how to walk. Their mother left a few days ago after he blew up at her. She said she had to get back to work. It was a lie. There's a part of her that really can't blame her mom for leaving - her father was a complete jerk to her and honestly, they're not married anymore, she doesn't necessarily have a responsibility to stay - but the other part of her, the bitter part, just scoffs and thinks, Well, Lord knows running when things get hard is what Dinah Lance does best.

For her part, Laurel isn't doing much better. Laurel - who people forget was there during his drinking, the only one who was, the only one who picked his drunken self up from dive bars in the middle of the night, wearing her pajamas and trying not to cry - is trying to focus her efforts on distracting him. She doesn't want to baby him, she doesn't want to get frustrated with him, and she knows that she'll never be able to one hundred percent understand how he's feeling, so she is just trying to keep his mind on something else.

That's why she winds up blurting out her baby news one morning, in his hospital room, while he and Sara are arguing.

Laurel and Sara have breakfast with their father every morning. It mostly consists of tea for Laurel, hot chocolate for Sara (because even the smell of coffee can send Laurel running to the bathroom, so Sara has opted to give up coffee for the time being, which is an incredibly sweet gesture, especially coming from Sara, who once said that if injecting coffee straight into her veins was an option she would do it in a heartbeat) and their father lamenting over how ''if he had known his last cup of coffee was his last cup ever he would have savored it more.''

And there's always at least a little awkwardness. The day after their mother leaves town, Sara and Laurel spend most of the morning looking at each other, unsure of what to say. One morning, when Laurel has to duck out of the room to go deal with a bad bout of morning sickness, she and Sara have to spend the rest of the morning convincing her father that she hasn't fallen off the wagon and it's not a hangover. Another time, he wanted to talk about Dean, so they wound up telling Sara stories about Dean and Laurel ended up dissolving into tears, which made him cry and it was a big sob fest. Then there are all the things they're avoiding talking about. Laurel's avoiding talking about her work, their father's avoiding talking about his health, and they're all avoiding talking about Sara's job and the fact that it's becoming increasingly obvious, judging from all the phone calls from Nyssa, that the League wants Sara back ASAP.

But Sara and Laurel always show up as soon as visiting hours start for breakfast with their dad, and no matter how weird things get, or how bad of a mood he's in, when they leave, they always hug him goodbye, tell him they love him, and he smiles.

Today, however. Today is shaping up to be a bad day. Laurel is not feeling well, she's nervous about her doctor's appointment, and she's trying to mentally prepare herself for the meeting at work this afternoon. Sara is upset, still tense from the screaming match she got into with Nyssa over the phone, and she looks like she wants to punch someone. Their father's mood is not much better. He's surly from the minute they get there and he won't tell them why.

It starts with awkward silence, delves into stilted conversation, and the next thing Laurel knows, an argument has erupted between her father and her sister. She's not sure what it's about - they seem to be jumping around a lot. One minute it's about Nyssa, the next it's about his health, then about Mom. They're all over the place. Just like old times. When they were teenagers, Laurel was the one who got into fights with their mother the most, which involved wordy rants and speeches and the silent treatment. Sara was the one who got into it with their father the most. They could scream at each other for hours. About anything and everything. In any space. One time, they got into a fight about Sara's bad boy boyfriend during dinner at a restaurant downtown and the whole family was asked to leave.

Laurel doesn't know who started this fight - she has been too busy trying to breathe through nausea and not throw up on the floor - but she's well aware of who is going to have to end it. She plans on standing up, inserting herself between them and informing them that they are in a hospital and they need to lower their voices because this is unacceptable behavior from two grown adults. That is her plan. Instead, for some reason, what happens is this:

Still sitting rigidly on the chair, staring down at her styrofoam cup of tea, she blurts out, ''I'm pregnant,'' without even looking up.

There is complete and utter silence in response to that.

Feeling strangely calm, Laurel lifts her eyes. Sara has whirled around to face her, an unidentifiable expression in her eyes. Her father is staring at her, eyes wide, mouth hanging open, too stunned to speak. When she notices his shock slowly give way to pity, she looks away from him and places her cup down on the floor. ''You're...'' He sounds like he has rocks in his throat.

She stares at the ground and pinches her lips together stubbornly. Okay, no. If he starts crying, she'll start crying. She stands up and meets his eyes, allowing a soft smile to grace her lips. ''Going to have a baby,'' she confirms. ''Yes.''

He is silent for a long time, which is...worrying. ''Is this...?'' He glances over at Sara, then back to Laurel. ''Are we happy about this?''

''Yes,'' she says. ''We're very happy.''

''I'm going to be a grandpa?''

''You're going to be a grandpa.''

He smiles. She can tell he's still trying to wrap his head around the news, but the smile he offers her is genuine and she can see the excitement in his eyes. ''I guess this means I'm officially an old man,'' he jokes.

''You're distinguished,'' Sara corrects.

''Congratulations, D,'' he says, and it's the old childhood nickname that does it. D. For Dinah. Dinah Laurel Lance. He used to call her that all the time. It feels like forever since he's used the nickname. She feels small, suddenly. Like she's a kid again. She has the sudden urge to crawl into the bed with him and let him wrap her up in his arms and protect her from the world like he used to do when she was little.

She takes his hand and smiles, eyes bright. ''Thank you.'' She leans down to press a kiss to his forehead. ''Now you have something to look forward to,'' she whispers in his ear.

She hopes that will be enough.

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In the waiting room of the doctor's office, Laurel's nerves have shifted into terror.

She found out she was pregnant through a blood test at the hospital and when she told the doctor about the trauma she had been through, she was ushered off to another wing of the hospital for a full check up to see ''if'' there was a heartbeat. That was the exact word that was used. If. And there had been. But she had been too shocked to pay attention, to hear the thump-thump over the roaring in her ears. She listened to everything the doctor told her, she asked for a print out of the ultrasound, she even went down to the hospital pharmacy to get prenatal vitamins. Then... Then she just shut down. Her father was in the hospital, in serious condition, her sister was off with a bunch of assassins being an assassin, she had no idea where Dean was, and she and Tommy had almost died. She couldn't think about a pregnancy. At least not until she could talk about it with Dean.

Now she's going to get to hear the heartbeat. She's going to get to hear the heartbeat, she's going to get at least three copies of the ultrasound, she's going to listen to everything the doctor tells her, and it's going to be terrifying and wonderful and exciting.

Unless.

Unless there is no heartbeat. It's a glass half empty line of thought. She knows she should be thinking happy thoughts, and that's exactly what she's trying to do. Thinking of all the things that could go wrong never helps. She should be thinking confident, positive thoughts instead of what ifs. It's just that it's hard not to think about those things when you've been through them.

.

.

.

Her first pregnancy was planned. Nobody knows that.

The list of people who knew about her pregnancy was extremely short. She had horrible morning sickness. The morning sickness is uncomfortable this time around, most of the time, she manages to keep things down pretty well. Her first pregnancy, however. That was a nightmare. She could barely keep anything down. Dean had to bundle her up and take her to the emergency room one night because she was so dehydrated. It was hard to hide the constant vomiting from people. Joanna and Sam figured out she was pregnant for themselves. She told her father because he was concerned for her health and thought something was seriously wrong.

Other than that, nobody knew.

She had wanted to wait until she was in her second trimester to make the announcement. Dean had wanted to shout it from the rooftops the minute he saw the positive pregnancy test, but she had read somewhere that it was the ''safest'' option.

Nobody knew it had been planned.

They had started talking about trying for a baby almost immediately after he got back from Purgatory - partly because they genuinely wanted it and partly because they were, somewhat desperately, trying to make up for lost time - but they put it off for a few months, just to give themselves some more time to think it over. They made the decision to officially start trying right before Christmas. She was pregnant by April.

A few days before she took in Taylor Moore, she took a pregnancy test while Dean was out getting dinner. It was positive. She can remember the anxiety she felt while she was pacing in the bathroom, waiting for the results. She can remember the coiled bundle of nerves and excitement sitting in her stomach like a rock. She can remember the happiness she felt when she saw those two pink lines. Most of all, what she remembers vividly, is Dean's reaction. He came into the bedroom the same time she exited the bathroom with the pregnancy test in her hand, and the second he saw it, her name died on his lips and he froze. Just stopped in his tracks and stared, open mouthed, at the tiny strip of plastic for at least a good minute.

She doesn't think it was the pregnancy test itself that had him frozen. They had been actively trying for a baby. He had gotten used to the sight of pregnancy tests. It was the look on her face that made this time different. ''Is that...?''

''It is.''

''Is it...?''

She nodded, lips tightening. ''It's positive.''

He blinked rapidly, swinging his gaze from her face to the pregnancy test and then back to her face. ''You're pregnant?'' It unnerved her that she couldn't decipher the look in his eyes. Usually she could decode his mood just from looking into his eyes. She was pretty proud of that fact. ''You're pregnant,'' he repeated, not a question this time. The corners of his lips twitched, like he wanted to smile but couldn't quite manage it. It worried her a little. Trying for a baby meant a hypothetical baby; a maybe baby; the mere idea of being parents. Her actually being pregnant meant they were going to be parents. It meant an actual real baby. Yeah, okay, so technically at that point, it was more of a lump of cells/parasite but it was a parasite they planned for, a lump of cells they very much wanted...

Right?

He did still want to have a baby with her, right? Oh, god. What if he didn't want to have a baby with her anymore? What if he had changed his mind?

Abruptly, visions of a sad, unhappy future crashed into her. She would be a single mother who had to work overtime just to get by. Dean would get the kid on the weekends and every other Wednesday. He'd be the fun parent - pie for dinner, pillow forts, and your bedtime is never - and her child would favor him, even though she was the reason they could afford the good school and the organic groceries. They'd grow to hate each other (he would resent her for trapping him, she would hate him for leaving her like everyone else) and when they saw each other, they'd both go for the heart just to make it hurt.

''You've got a lot of your father in you, don't you?'' She would ask, with a perfectly sweet, perfectly venomous smile, relishing in the way he would recoil.

He would come back with a sneer of, ''You look like your mother when you smile like that, Dinah. I think I finally understand why Oliver got on that boat with your sister.''

And their child would hear all of it, hiding behind her father's leg, crushed and frightened, resentment starting in her young heart and growing and growing until she grew up to be just as damaged as they were, if not more.

Wait. Wait, no. That was ridiculous. That wasn't them. That would never be them. They would never say things like that to each other.

She took a deep breath and tried to smile. ''I'm pregnant,'' she said. ''Hey.'' In an effort to diffuse the tension that really only existed in her head, she punched him on the shoulder playfully and joked, ''Go team, huh?''

It clearly wasn't what he was expecting because he looked mildly startled for a brief second and then, lips curving into a genuine smile, he started to laugh. ''We're going to have a baby,'' he said, and his voice was so unusually, uncharacteristically soft, so raw with emotion and awe, that it just swept all of her worries away. Relief seeped into her smile and she started to cry, tears of joy and excitement and fear and relief, and then he was scooping her up in his arms and twirling her around.

Three weeks later, she lost the baby.

.

.

.

Her doctor is cold.

Professional, thorough, clearly intelligent, but compassionless and flippant. Laurel doesn't want to assume it's because he's a man because you know what they say about assuming, but at the same time, this crotchety, white haired doctor most likely doesn't know what it feels to wake up in the middle of the night bleeding and cramping so badly you can't even speak, fully aware of what's happening and powerless to stop it, so let's be real: it's probably because he's a man.

He somehow manages to have a tone of voice that is both bored and impatient when he asks her, ''Is this your first pregnancy?''

She doesn't know what to say. She looks over at Sara, who is staring at the 3D diagram of a dilating cervix and the posters of a woman's changing body during pregnancy, pale and horrified. ''It's my second,'' Laurel says, so quietly and reluctantly it's like she's confessing to a crime.

Sara whips her head around to face Laurel. She looks alarmed.

''I miscarried last year,'' Laurel goes on. There is no tremor in her voice. She says it matter-of-fact, strongly, but she doesn't dare look at Sara. ''I was injured in the earthquake. They checked me out at the hospital and said I was fine. They said my pelvic bones had likely protected the...'' She trails off. The what? The baby? Was it a baby? ''But I miscarried the night after. I was never given an answer as to why. I don't know if it was because of the trauma, or the stress, or just some random thing.''

''If the trauma was severe enough, it was most likely the cause,'' the doctor says, voice clipped.

She flinches. Yeah, well, she's definitely going to be switching doctors after today so there. She is already perfectly aware that it was her fault, thank you. She doesn't need anyone to remind her of that.

When she can bring herself to look over at Sara, she notices that Sara is glaring at the doctor with narrowed eyes and an extreme level of malice. Laurel is struck by the sudden, inexplicable urge to laugh. She knows that her little sister is not just that beautiful, stuffed shark hugging ballerina anymore. She knows that Sara is dangerous. She is a leather clad vigilante with blood on her hands and one hell of a protective streak. But here she is, all 5'5 of her, glaring daggers at some asshole doctor who is, let's face it, probably near retirement. It's so outlandish that she can't help but let out a quiet chuckle. The sound of her laugh seems to relax Sara, because she looks away from the doctor and focuses on Laurel, offering her a soothing smile.

Laurel knows from experience that the first doctor's appointment is not only the longest but the one that sends your head spinning because of information overload. This time is no different. The doctor asks her roughly a gazillion questions, takes blood and urine samples, does fifty thousand tests including a pelvic exam and pap smear, and then comes the heartbeat.

The doctor is a straight up douchebag, there's no denying that, and if Laurel doesn't switch doctors, Sara will end up introducing his head to the wall. He goes over the lists of things to do, things not to do, things to avoid, with a truly impressive level of condescension in his voice. She talks about the addiction issues on both her side of the family and the baby's father's side, and he's openly judgmental about it. He is downright gross when she reveals her own addiction issues and how relatively new sobriety is for her. He is also quite perturbed by the lack of a father and only stops asking ''if she's sure he won't be joining us'' when Sara hisses at him, ''He was a hero who died, could you maybe think about shutting up about it?'' Which is the nicest thing Sara has ever said about Dean.

By the end of the appointment, Sara is ready to leap over Laurel and throw the doctor out the window. Laurel, on the other hand, would gladly and willingly sit through hours of his bullshit without giving a single fuck because she knows what's coming and she knows it's worth it.

The heartbeat comes at the end of the appointment. After all of the tests and the lectures, she lays back in her paper gown, and she gets to hear the heartbeat.

This is the moment where it sinks in. Not the pregnancy. That has already sunk in. The constant nausea made sure of that. The fact that she is going to be a mother. There is a small, cynical part of her that is saying, don't get your hopes up, that's not what happened last time, something could still go wrong, you could still lose it. For the most part, however, mostly what she is thinking is that she's going to be somebody's mom.

In a few months, there will be a baby. A tiny little human with soft fuzz and that clean, milky, baby smell, swaddled in blankets. A helpless infant who will need her. Then there will be a toddler with sticky fingers, a gummy smile, and a propensity for jumping in mud puddles without rain boots. A gap toothed kindergartener who runs and plays, screams at the top of their lungs, scrapes their knees, and still fits perfectly into her arms. An elementary schooler who loves the monkey bars, sings in the school play with the rest of their class, and desperately wants to swing from building to building with Uncle Ollie. A twelve year old who doesn't want her forehead kisses anymore but always turns around and smiles on their way into school, and can't decide whether they want to be a superhero like Auntie Sara or a superhero like Daddy. A rebellious teenager who cuts curfew, slams doors, sneaks out, and talks back but still asks, every now and then, when things are quiet, ''Do I look like him?''

She wants their child to have his eyes. His beautiful green eyes, so much like his mother's. She wants their child to have his laugh. She wants their child to know who he was; all of the amazing things he did, all of the people he saved, all of the wonderful ways he loved her and how much he would have wanted him or her, if only he had known. They are going to have a baby. There is going to be a whole new person in the world made from pieces of them. And Dean will never know.

Not for the first time, she is struck by the crushing, blinding unfairness of it all. It is a sharp pain in her chest, an intake of breath, a twisting in her gut. The version of Dean who lives in her head, the one who haunts her out of the corner of her eye, the ghost in the machine, says, I would have stayed for you.

She wants to thank him for leaving behind this last piece of him, she wants to scream at him for daring to leave her when he promised her he wouldn't, and she wants to promise him that she will protect this baby with all that she has.

Sara, who had scrambled for Laurel's hand the moment the delicate thump-thump-thump started to echo through the room, manages to sum it all up in one breathless, ''Holy fucking shit.''

Laurel, suddenly aware of the wetness on her cheeks, starts to laugh. She doesn't bother to wipe away her tears. She squeezes her little sister's hand and says, ''I know, right?''

Neither one of them look away from the grainy black and white image on the screen.

In her head, the ghost asks, Why couldn't I stay?

.

.

.

Laurel hasn't been into the office since Kate Spencer was killed.

She feels like she should be surprised by the absolute mess that greets her when she walks into the offices, but she's really not. She may not have been part of Spencer's inner circle - Kate's dislike of her was fairly well known throughout the office, which Laurel fully understands because she did, after all, blackmail her twice - but she admired her greatly. Kate Spencer was a brilliant, ruthless lawyer. She ran a tight ship. Without her, the DA's office is fucked. This is a fact.

Kate Spencer was also a single mother of a six year old boy named Ramsey.

That is a thought that slams into Laurel violently when she walks into the office and sees Kate's empty chair. It leaves her winded, heart racing in her chest, guilt blooming in her gut. If she had pushed the Sebastian Blood issue, if she had taken care of him sooner, realized what he was, would that little boy still have a mother? Would Starling City still have a kickass District Attorney to protect them?

If you're a person of power in this corrupt city of shadows, are you inherently in danger? How many children have lost parents in the past two years? How many children are going to lose parents in the next two? The next five? The next twenty? Is that what's going to happen to her? Will she be the next Starling City parent to die? Has she become a target just by getting pregnant?

The acting DA is a sweaty man in a wrinkled, ill fitting suit. He looks utterly terrified to be in this position of power. When he invites her into the office (not Kate's office, he says it wouldn't feel right), she settles herself in the chair across from the desk and idly wishes she could pop one of the ginger chews she's taken to carrying around with her into her mouth without it seeming rude. She watches him shuffle case files around on his disproportionately messy desk and listens to him clear his throat obnoxiously. She crosses one leg over the other and her dark blue skirt rides up, just a little. His eyes sweep over her legs briefly before he looks away, dabbing at his forehead with a disgustingly damp handkerchief.

She grimaces.

When she somehow manages not to roll her eyes at him, she mentally pats herself on the back.

''Mr. Anderson,'' she says, interrupting his nervous fidgeting. The sound of her voice seems to startle him. ''If you're going to fire me, can you please get it over with? I have things.''

His lips part and he stares at her with stunned, beady eyes. ''I'm not going to fire you,'' he tells her. He seems legitimately offended by the mere suggestion.

''You're not?''

''Of course not.'' He sits back in his chair. ''Ms. Lance,'' he says. ''I don't want to fire you. I want to promote you.''

...Oh. She had not been expecting that. ''Promote me?''

''Yes.'' He clasps his hands. ''Ms. Lance, how would you feel about being the new District Attorney?''

Laurel's heart drops into her stomach.

What happens if she dies? If she becomes the next parental casualty? What happens then? What happens to her child if she dies here, in this office, just like Kate Spencer did? What would happen to her little orphaned son or daughter? Would Sara take them in? Dad? Tommy? How much of their life would they spend missing the father they never knew and the mother who was taken away from them? She swallows hard. In this city, chances are she'll die young.

But she doesn't want to die here.

.

.

.

Laurel is trying really hard not to panic right now.

Yes, okay, so she just made a snap decision that will one hundred percent change her life. Yes, it's entirely possible that she just threw everything she has ever worked for down the drain. And yes, she is freaking the fuck out and screaming internally. But she's about to walk into her apartment, Sara most likely will be there, and she's not sure if she wants to share her secret just yet. She feels like she should sleep on it. If she wakes up tomorrow and has no desire to change her mind, then she'll tell her. If she wakes up tomorrow thinking she's made the worst mistake of her life, then she'll call Anderson, beg, and there'll be nothing left to tell.

She steps off the elevator and takes three deep breaths. Somebody told her, once, that taking three deep breaths is supposed to help with anxiety. She's not really sure why. It's most likely more of a placebo effect than anything else. If you are told that this will help, then your mind will be open to it helping. Regardless, it is something that has stuck with her. To be brutally honest, it stopped helping a long time ago but it's still a nervous habit of hers.

Laurel takes three deep breaths, paints on a smile, and pretends she's okay. It's been like that for so long she's forgotten if there was ever any other way to be.

The apartment is dark when she walks in, save for one dim lamp and a few scattered candles. She can smell vanilla from the candles and the faintest hint of coffee, which is probably the reason for the scented candles. And the very first thing she hears, upon entering, is Dean's laugh.

She holds her breath. Her keys slip from her suddenly numb fingers and go clattering to the floor along with her bag.

There's this nasty, cruel moment where she starts to wonder. Has she gone crazy? Was it all a dream? Is there room for hope? Maybe he was never gone. He was here, he was always here, waiting for her, and she was just having a terrible, extremely vivid nightmare. Or maybe he's come back. It wouldn't be the first time. Maybe there's one last miracle for them. Maybe they get one last chance to get it right this time.

Then she hears Danny de la Vega's voice.

Still feeling numb from the shock, she makes her way into the living room. Her hope disintegrates all at once, her breath whooshing out of her and her shoulders deflating. Sara is already standing, looking guilty and panicked. She's talking but Laurel honestly can't hear anything over the roaring in her ears and the voices of the dead men. Her eyes are glued to the television screen where Dean and Danny are laughing, the both of them lit up by the array of the Christmas lights behind them. They look so happy, glowing in the lights, chatting amicably. They look so alive.

There are ghosts in her home.

The two murdered men on the screen have no idea what's going to happen to them. Danny has no idea that in a matter of months, he will burn up, killed by a broken man with a chip on his shoulder, leaving his family reeling and his son orphaned. Dean has no idea that he will eventually die slowly, over a matter of months, withering and crumpling under an enormous weight until a blade tears through him and takes him away. They have no idea how it will end for them.

She remembers that night. It was the year before last, the first weekend in December. It was the night of the annual light up in downtown Starling City. Every year, on the first weekend in December, they lit up the huge Christmas tree down by the water and then had a party. It was more for kids than adults, with hot chocolate, live music, an outdoor skating rink, and a ''surprise'' visit from Santa Claus himself (aka the Mayor because a Mayor who dresses up like Santa Claus gets mad respect, which leads to votes). It was an event for kids and their parents. Before that night, the last time Laurel had been to it was when she was twenty and Sara had dragged her there to skate, which mostly meant both of them in a crumpled heap on the ice, giggling madly because neither one of them knew how to skate.

That year, Nate de la Vega had begged them to come along with him and his dad, and Dean and Laurel had always been bad at saying no to Nate. They went to the light up with Nate, Joanna, and Danny, who had been toting a video camera because A) he was a dad, and B) he was bound and determined to get his sister - a former figure skater - back out on the ice.

It was a good night. She remembers that.

Less than three months later, Danny was dead.

Laurel swallows the lump in her throat. There are so many people in this blurry, shaking home movie who she misses. Dean, Danny, Jo, Nate. Those last two are of her own making, she knows. She was the one who pushed Jo away after the earthquake, while she was spiraling. She and Dean both dropped the ball with Nate. They promised that little boy, after Danny's death, that they weren't going to leave him. That they would always be there for him. That they would help Jo adjust to suddenly raising her nephew on her own. Our door is always open, they had said. They failed. Miserably. They kept up with their promise for awhile, but after everything that happened in their lives... Things sort of went to shit. They did their best. They did. But then. Well.

Maybe it was selfish of them to break apart the way they did. Maybe they should have tried harder to breathe, to live through it rather than waiting to die. Maybe they should have been there for Nate, for Jo, for Sam and Sara, for everyone but themselves, like they always had before, but the fact remains that is not how it happened. The bitter truth - the one she's never said out loud, the one everyone refuses to acknowledge - is that there were times then they didn't want to live through it. One of them didn't.

Still, watching this, seeing how happy they were, how much that boy adored them, Laurel can't help but feel guilty. They fucked up. They fucked up big.

On the screen, there is the distinctive squeal of mic feedback and then someone starts talking. Danny swivels the camera around to face the MC - it was Adam Donner that year, he had introduced himself to her later that night, told her he admired what she was doing with CNRI - and while Adam drones on about the history of the light up, Laurel notices Dean and Nate, standing at the back of the crowd, just in the camera's view. Nate tugs on Dean's sleeve and Dean leans down so that Nate can whisper something in his ear. Whatever he says, it makes Dean laugh. Full on head tilted back, full body laughter.

Laurel can't help but smile.

That is where Sara chooses to pause it.

Of course it is.

Laurel cannot look away from the frozen image of Dean laughing. As it turns out, videos are different. Looking at a picture of Dean is one thing, but watching a video of him laughing and happy brings on a whole new wave of excruciating devastation. Awesome.

She looks away from the screen and surveys the mess of the living room with a sigh. Sara has Laurel's laptop open and a slideshow of pictures is playing silently, there are photo albums open on the table and loose photographs on the floor. Laurel's entire relationship is splayed out on her living room floor, laid bare in front of Sara, from home movies to pictures to the Wish You Were Here postcards of the American Midwest that Dean sent her when he was on the road; his way of saying, I miss you.

Her first instinct is to be angry. She is trying her best to stay upright these days. She is trying really hard to want to stay. It's hard work and it's every day and just as she manages to reach a point where she thinks she might be able to someday find something that at least resembles okay, Sara goes and brings out all of the pieces of the life she doesn't get to live anymore. And she didn't even ask. Laurel wants to be angry. She wants to be frustrated that Sara rifled through her things. But then she sees her sister's face.

Sara's face is pale and streaked with tears. Her lower lip is trembling and her entire body is shivering from the effort it's taking for her to keep somewhat composed. Laurel has no idea what's going on, but whatever it is, she needs to fix it. ''Sara, what - ''

''I wanted to know,'' Sara says, voice raspy and shaky. ''I wanted to know who he was. You... You were right.'' She wrings her hands nervously, glancing over at the mess on the floor. ''I...'' She closes her eyes, regretful. ''...I thought the worst of him. I have a hard time trusting men. I have a hard time seeing the good in them after what I've been through. And when I saw Dean...'' She shrugs, looking strangely helpless, which is such a weird thing to see because Sara Lance has never been helpless. ''He was...gruff and surly and I thought...'' She trails off, swallowing audibly. ''I don't know what I thought. You were just so vulnerable when I came back, Laurel.''

Laurel shifts from foot to foot uncomfortably, looking down at her shoes.

''You were suffering,'' Sara says, ''and I couldn't let him hurt you. I refused to let him hurt you. I thought the worst of him, I did, and maybe that was wrong. I don't know. I don't know him at all. But you loved him. You loved him so much. He couldn't have been that bad. So I - I snooped. I shouldn't have. I'm sorry.'' She shakes her head. ''I just wanted to know.''

Which is sweet, and Laurel loves her just a little bit more for it, but somehow she doubts this breakdown is because Sara has joined Team Dean and is grieving the loss along with her. She may be trying to understand but she doesn't change her mind that easily. She never has. Laurel knows this. She takes a cautious step toward her sister. ''Sara - ''

''How can you look at me?''

Um.

That took an unexpected turn.

Laurel frowns. ''What?'' She reaches for Sara, but Sara backs away from her like she's afraid her touch will turn her to dust. Laurel stops. She wants to wrap her sister up in her arms and do anything to get her to stop crying, but she doesn't. It's clear that it's not what Sara wants at this moment, so Laurel stays a safe distance away and gives Sara room to breathe. Even that doesn't seem to help. ''Sweetie, what are you - ''

''How can you even stand to be in the same room as me after everything that's happened to you because of me?''

A lump forms in Laurel's throat and she can't speak. She wouldn't know what to say anyway. She clutches the back of the sofa, fingers digging into the fabric. ''...Oh, Sara.''

''You were happy, Laurel,'' Sara spits out angrily. There is a startling amount of venom in her voice. It makes Laurel wince. Regret seems to be weighing Sara down, pulling her into herself, making her appear small and childlike, and there are tears slipping down her cheeks. She has never looked more like that little ballerina who chased butterflies and crawled into bed with her big sister when she had a nightmare.

Every single one of Laurel's instincts are screaming, Protect.

''You were happy here,'' Sara gestures toward the pictures. ''That's what I learned. You were happy despite me. Despite Oliver. Despite everything that happened, you were strong enough to find happiness again. And it's not fair that you didn't get to keep that. Oliver came back and you got sucked right back into his tornado of a life. And then I came back. And I'm sorry. We shouldn't have...'' She wraps her arms around herself. ''We didn't deserve to come back. You didn't deserve this. We - Oliver and I have been chipping away at you for years and it's not fair. You were poisoned because of me. Kidnapped because of Oliver. Every bad thing that has happened to you has happened because I got on that stupid boat with your boyfriend.''

Laurel grimaces. ''That's not true.''

''It is! It is true, Laurel!'' Sara is bordering on hysterics. She's crying these gulping, heaving sobs and she's shivering uncontrollably. Laurel is trying not to think too hard about what Sara is saying. Once upon a time, she would have given anything to hear these words. To hear someone tell her that all that hate and all that anger that she carried around for years was justified. But now.

She is tired, okay? She feels like she keeps saying that but nobody seems to understand what she's saying. When she says she's tired, she doesn't mean she needs rest. She doesn't mean she needs a vacation or a day off. She means she is tired of this life. She's not tired of life in general. She's just tired of this life. This shitty life that never gets any better. This fucked up existence where she is never allowed to hurt, or be happy, or move on, or do anything, without someone commenting on how she's not doing it right or bringing up things she has worked her ass off trying to move on from just because they need absolution.

What she means when she says she's tired is that she needs something else.

''I was a stupid, selfish little girl,'' Sara snarls, with such contempt and malice that Laurel is startled by it. She hasn't heard that amount of self hatred since Dean. Or the voices in her own head. ''I made a bad choice and you were the one who was punished for it! How is that fair? How can you not hate me? I destroyed your entire life. I ruined you. You should hate me. Why don't you hate me?''

She is rambling and barely coherent, nose running, tears streaming down her face, a mess of heaving sobs and screeches. Laurel will never say this out loud, but there is a tiny part of her that is relieved. Sara was never a quiet girl. She was always stubborn and hot headed and passionate, just like Laurel, only in a different way. When she felt something, she not only let herself feel it, she let it consume her. If Laurel allowed her feelings to control her, Sara allowed them to shape her and shape her they did. Into a wild, fiery party girl who was fiercely loyal, overprotective, and wanted to be a ballerina. She was never quiet. Ever since she's been back, she has been quiet. She has been walking around with an air of calmness surrounding her. One that doesn't fit. One that isn't Sara. At first, Laurel thought it was some form of maturity. Over time, she had realized that it wasn't a coping mechanism. She was just internalizing it all. It was only a matter of time until she exploded. Laurel has always known that. I mean, look at her. Over this past year, she has exploded like a dying star. She just hadn't been expecting Sara's explosion to go quite like this.

She closes the distance between them in a run, wrapping her baby sister up in her arms. Sara clings to her, just like she used to do when she was little. ''I could never hate you,'' Laurel murmurs.

''You should,'' is the mumbled reply.

''No, I shouldn't.''

''I'm sorry.''

Laurel closes her eyes. ''I know,'' she whispers, stroking Sara's hair lightly. ''I know, Sare-bear.'' She pulls away from the embrace and takes Sara's face in her hands. She doesn't say anything for a moment, she just offers her sister a soft smile and then she wipes away her tears with the pad of her thumb and leans in to kiss Sara's forehead. Sara, no longer sobbing but still sniffling, hands desperately clutching at Laurel's wrists, relaxes ever so slightly at the gesture of comfort, which Laurel is going to count as a victory.

She plucks a tissue from the box on the table and starts mopping up the mess of tears on Sara's cheeks. She's mildly surprised when Sara lets her. Sara used to moan, ''Oh my god, Laurel, stop it. I already have a mom. I don't need another one.'' Never mind the fact that their mother was never the kind of mom who wiped away her child's tears. She was the kind of mother who kissed her daughter on the forehead, handed her a tissue, and said, ''Clean yourself up, darling.''

''Listen,'' Laurel says. ''You hurt me, Sara. You did.'' When Sara's lips tighten and the dam threatens to break again, she takes her hands and says, firmly, ''You did not ruin me. Okay? Only I have the power to do that.''

Sara grabs another tissue and tears away at it nervously, awkwardly shuffling from foot to foot. ''I'm still sorry,'' she says, lifting her gaze. ''I need you to know that. I've never... I've owed you this apology forever and it still doesn't feel like enough. I'm so sorry. I will be sorry for the rest of my life.''

''Well, I don't want that,'' Laurel states bluntly. ''I don't want you to live with that. I just want you to live.''

Sara smiles weakly. She blows her nose and wipes at her eyes with the back of her hand. ''You know,'' her voice is still thick with the tears clogging up her throat. She nods to the TV. ''He did have a great laugh.''

It's not quite approval and it's clear she only wants to change the subject, but Laurel appreciates it nonetheless. ''He did,'' she says. ''Hey,'' she reaches over to grasp Sara's hand, pulling her down onto the couch with her. ''Let me show you something.'' She picks up one of the photo albums - the one full of Christmas pictures, past and present - and flips through it until she finds what she's looking for. Sandwiched in between a picture of her and Grandma and the posed picture of her with Mom and Dad in front of the Christmas tree is a picture of her and Dean sitting at the dinner table, smiling for the camera, pressed close together. It would be a perfectly happy picture if it weren't for the fact that not ten minutes before this picture was taken, she had been sitting at the table weeping, with Dean whispering in her ear, desperately trying to calm her down before anyone - especially her father - noticed. ''Do you see this picture? This was Christmas day a couple years ago. Notice how red my eyes are? It's because I kept randomly bursting into tears all day because Christmas was your birthday and your favourite holiday and you weren't there to celebrate it with me.''

She flips the page and points to another picture. ''See how worn out I look here? This was taken a few days after Christmas. The day after Christmas, I spent the entire day in bed, sobbing, because I missed you. I always missed you. I missed everything about you. From watching you dance to when you would call me and ask for money because you were too scared to ask Mom and Dad.'' She hands Sara the album and grabs her laptop, flicking through the pictures until she gets to one of her and Joanna. ''And this? This was a week before the anniversary of when the boat went down. Jo wanted to cheer me up, so she took me out for dinner and drinks but all I could think of was you.''

She pushes the laptop away from her and takes Sara's hands in hers. ''I was happy with Dean, Sara,'' she says, ''but I was never happy that you were gone. Whatever mistakes you made, whatever anger I was holding onto, I loved you. I love you.'' She's not sure what else she can say to make it better, to get through to Sara, so she just smiles tenderly and ticks a strand of Sara's hair behind her ear. ''You're my girl.'' Sara doesn't answer, but she doesn't need to. She's staring down at the Christmas pictures, lips pressed together, looking thoughtful. Laurel squeezes her hand gently. ''I feel like tonight's an ice cream for dinner kind of night,'' she says. ''I'm going to go pull out my emergency rocky road.''

''That's not a balanced meal,'' Sara says. ''Little Lance needs healthy foods.''

Laurel shrugs, rising to her feet and stripping off her red coat. ''Then we'll dip celery sticks and baby carrots in the ice cream.''

''That's messed up,'' Sara calls after her, though Laurel can hear the smile in her voice.

Laurel laughs. ''Just wait until the pregnancy cravings start.'' She makes it as far as three steps before she halts in her tracks, the hair on the back of her neck standing up. Her entire body goes rigid and tense and her breath catches. There is something incredibly distinctive about the feeling of eyes on you. She can't describe it, but it's something she knows all too well. She knows what it feels like to be watched. Slowly, she turns around to face the window, squinting into the darkness.

''Laurel? What's wrong?''

She strides right over to the window and stares out into the night, searching for prying eyes. She can just make out the roof of the building across the street and the sight of a dark shadow stepping away from the ledge and melting back into the inky night. Her throat dries up. It looked like a person. For a second, the shape of the shadow almost looked like... No. She shakes her head. That's ridiculous. It doesn't make any sense. It's just her grief in overdrive.

''Are you okay?'' Sara is suddenly right beside her, placing a hand on her arm. ''Talk to me.''

Laurel drops her hands to her stomach. ''I,'' it comes out in a croak. ''I'm fine,'' she gets out, which she is. She is fine. She's just grieving. This is normal. You see the dead everywhere you go when you're grieving. That's all. Or, hey. Maybe it was Oliver. He's pretty much a glorified stalker at times. Plus, he's overprotective. Oh, geez. It was definitely Oliver. She lets out a sigh and tries to laugh it off. This is what happens when your friends are overprotective vigilantes, right?

''It was nothing,'' she says, and closes the curtains.

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For so long, everything in Dean Winchester's pathetic, miserable mess of a life has always come back to fire.

Everything burns eventually.

His mother, his father, Jess, Bobby, Ellen and Jo, Adam, Rufus, Ash, Kevin, and so many others. They're all cinders now, ashes of bones and muscle and flesh that once made a person. How did it take him this long to notice? How could it have taken thirty plus years to realize? I'll burn for that, he had said, after Kevin. Except he won't. He's not going to burn, he's not about to burn. He has always been burning. He's been running from the fire since he was four years old and the part he failed to understand is that he never escaped in the first place.

Ruby told him once, Sooner or later, Hell will burn away your humanity. She had said it so fiercely, with such conviction, so sure she was right, but she was wrong. Hell hadn't burned away his humanity. Life did.

You can't outrun the flames forever, his mother's voice says.

He says, Then watch me burn for you, Mom.

Fuck running, he has decided. If the fire wants him, it can have him. He'll stand still in the flames and let them lick away at his skin, crawl their way up his body until the only thing left is a burning man. And then he will control it. He may not be able to run from the fire, but do you know what he can do? He can use it.

On the roof, across from the building that still makes his heart drum against his ribcage noisily because home, Dean hops up on the ledge and looks down at the lights and the cars and the people below. He spreads his arms wide and stands on one foot, leaning over. His lips curl into a slow, predatory grin. His is utterly indifferent to the height in ways he wasn't before. Ways he never will be again. What does height matter when you're a demon? He's not afraid of falling. He's already fallen as far as he can go.

He looks over at the building across the street. She's not home. He can see her sister moving around, settling down in the living room, but she's not the Lance he came to see. Dean looks away from the window. He tilts his head back to look at the stars. The world is different from a demon's view. He had thought it would be dull and colorless, flat and underwhelming; a disappointment. It's not. The world is anything but underwhelming. It is too colorful, too loud, too violent, too vibrant, too fast, too much. It hurts to look at.

No wonder so many demons wind up going insane.

Emotions are the same. Instead of everything being dulled or lessened, he finds his emotions have been surprisingly heightened since becoming...this. He feels everything. He had never been a halfway kind of guy when he was alive. Not really. He pretended to be but there were always people he couldn't fool. This is completely different. Everything is intense and painful. It cuts deep, crawls under his skin, and he can't get it out. Everything tastes like blood and dirt and ashes. He can still feel that old familiar sorrow in his bones. Is this what it feels like to lose it? In the past week, Dean has learned that being a demon is made up of the most perverse pleasures and the most intense pain.

And then there's Laurel.

He turns back to the warmly lit apartment just in time to see her step through the door, and he almost falls off the ledge. Seeing her is like a sucker punch. It leaves him winded and gasping for breath. When he was alive, he had mistakenly believed demons couldn't love. Oh, how wrong he was. Dean stands there, gawking, mouth open, eyes bright. Laurel Lance has always been gorgeous; poised and elegant, confident posture, legs that go on for miles, angel eyes and a smile that could bring a grown man to his knees. And, in fact, has. He should know. He's lost count of how many times he's gotten down on his knees for her. He has never seen her through these eyes before.

She glows. Laurel fuckin' glows.

Have you ever seen anything more beautiful? Have you ever seen anything more alive?

She does look tired, though. Exhausted, really. Run down and ragged. He can't see her close up, but he can tell that her favourite red jacket doesn't fit the way it used to. It's tight across her chest, maybe her stomach too. Otherwise, she looks healthy. Probably healthier than she's been this past year. She looks...okay. He tilts his head to the side and walks along the edge as she moves farther into the apartment. He wonders, briefly, if she's taking care of herself. Remembering to eat and sleep. She forgets to eat when she gets in the zone at work. Has she been working a lot lately? Throwing herself into the job like she did after the earthquake? After the miscarriage? He used to have to call her and remind her to take a break and eat, or show up at the office with food. He hopes someone has been reminding her to eat. He hopes someone has been helping her. No one ever helps her.

Sara better be fucking helping her.

He draws in a rattling breath.

Of course she's taking care of herself. She's pregnant. She'll do anything if it means keeping the baby safe and healthy.

The baby.

There's a baby.

He stumbles off the ledge and back onto the roof. He shouldn't be here. He can't afford to be here. He's putting them in danger. The body remembers her. The body wants to go home. The body can never go home again. Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck. What is he doing here? He can't be the reason something happens to her or the baby.

''Do I need to kill her?''

Dean stops breathing. His facial expression, which had been stuck somewhere between lost little boy and mildly crazed, shifts easily into homicidal rage. His fists clench. The sorrow stops.

His body says, Protect.

His mind says, Don't you dare blow your cover, you worthless sack of shit.

So he laughs. It's a loud, careless king of laughter, bordering on mocking. ''If you feel like it,'' he says lazily, turning to face Crowley. ''Am I supposed to care? She ain't my problem anymore.'' What he means is, if Laur gets so much as a paper cut that can be traced back to you, I will rip your head from your body with my bare hands and shove it up your ass. He works really hard not to say that out loud, though. That's probably the kind of thing that would give him away.

Crowley doesn't look like he believes him. His hands are stuffed into the pockets of his black coat and his eyes are gleaming, like he's just waiting for Dean to slip up and reveal his true colors. He's a pretty paranoid guy. He doesn't seem to believe that Dean is on his side and he's oddly fixated on the idea of having to recalibrate him. ''Then why are you here, Dean?''

That is a good question. Dean licks his lips, scrambling for an excuse. ''Her sister,'' he says lightly, strolling towards Crowley, gait carefully controlled. ''I wanted to see if she was still in town.''

''Why?''

''Because she's going to be a massive pain in the ass,'' Dean says, arching an eyebrow. ''She works for Queen and the Scooby Gang wannabes. You do know that, right?''

Crowley stares at him for a long time before he clears his throat and nods. ''Of course I knew that.'' The tone of his voice tells Dean that he did not, in fact, know that. He brushes past Dean to look in the apartment window. As soon as Crowley turns his back, Dean rolls his eyes. What a dumbass. He swallows the urge to push the bastard off the roof. ''How good is she?''

''Better than he is.''

Crowley doesn't even hesitate. With a careless shrug of one shoulder, he says, simply, ''Kill her.''

Dean tenses momentarily but forces himself to relax. He laughs; a throaty growl of a laugh. ''Are you a moron?''

When Crowley turns to face him, there is a deep frown marring his face and he looks insulted. ''I feel like that was largely uncalled for.''

Dean makes a show of letting out a long, put upon sigh. ''I'm not killing her, Crowley.''

''You're a demon. That's what we do.''

''Look, you want me to take out the Robin Hood cosplayer, that's fine, but I'm not killing Sara Lance.''

''Why not?''

''Because of Laurel.''

Crowley releases his own long suffering sigh and pinches the bridge of his nose with his thumb and forefinger. ''Dean, I'm going to confess something to you. I had high hopes for you. When you turned, I thought this change would make you less of an insufferable, bitter disappointment, but so far you have proven to be nothing more than a pretty face, a brainless idiot, and a completely useless knight of Hell!'' By the end of his overdramatic speech, he is standing on his tip toes just so he can be almost face to face with Dean, inches away from him, spitting mad.

Dean is so proud of himself for not rolling his eyes again. Oh, please. He's heard worse things from his own father. Still, he manages to summon up enough anger to make it look real. With a snarl, he grasps Crowley's jacket, drags him off the ledge and sends his fist crashing into Crowley's nose. The force of the blow sends Crowley to the ground and he barely gets a chance to wipe at the blood before Dean is standing over him, grabbing the lapels of his jacket and yanking him up. ''A knight's job is to protect the king, you ungrateful piece of shit.'' His eyes dilate black and he leans in close. ''You want me to be your knight? Let me do my fucking job.'' He shoves Crowley away from him and stands straight. ''If Sara dies, Laurel will come for us.''

''Laurel,'' Crowley laughs around the blood running into his mouth, coloring his teeth a grotesque shade of red, ''is a waste of space human being. What could she possibly do?''

The urge to slam his fist into Crowley's chest and remove his heart is incredibly strong. ''She'll kill you,'' he says. ''And me. And anyone who had a hand in her sister's death.''

''Oh, if only there was a simple solution for that dreadful problem. Just kill her too, you idiot!''

''Okay, and then we'll have Oliver gunning for us.''

''Then kill everyone!''

''Right, because a bloody massacre falls under the category of,'' he curls his fingers into air quotes, ''flying under the radar. Isn't that what you said you wanted to do?'' He crosses his arms, watching as Crowley struggles to his feet, attempting to stop the bleeding. ''I'm your knight. You're the one who wanted me to be. I'm not going to do something that pits these people against us. Especially not a pissed off big sis. That would be suicide.''

Crowley considers this, wiping the last bit of blood off his face with his sleeve. Finally, he smiles. It's a creepy smile, with too much teeth and a disturbingly penetrating look in his eyes. ''Awww,'' he steps closer to Dean, then closer, then too close. Dean pushes back a flinch and tries not to think about the momentary flash of fear that skitters through his head at the proximity. Crowley has never been shy about his penchant for lacing almost everything he says with an underlying threat of sexualized violence, and this is not the first fuckin' time he has called Dean pretty. ''You like me,'' Crowley says, voice quiet and honeyed and disturbing. ''You really like me.'' He falls silent and stares up at Dean for a moment. Dean forces himself to stay quiet, stay calm, and stay still. It's only when Crowley takes a step back that he even allows himself to breathe. ''If a bloody massacre is out of the question,'' Crowley hums, ''what do you propose?''

''I propose,'' is the hissed reply, ''that you get the fuck outta dodge and let me handle this. We're here because you need something. I'll get it for you if you stop fuckin' breathing down my neck.'' He puts his hands on his hips. ''Listen, man, I work for you. Let me work.''

Surprisingly, it only takes Crowley a moment to agree. He cocks his head to the side, studies Dean with narrowed, distrusting eyes, and then shrugs. ''Fine. Do it your way. But if you fail,'' he grins cheerfully and throws his arm around Dean's shoulder. ''I'm going to kill everyone.'' He turns him around to face the apartment across the street. ''Starting with your lovely - apparently lethal - ex and the little thing growing inside of her.''

...Well.

Apparently there is a worse feeling then having a blade driven into your heart. Good to know. He was wondering about that. His jaw clenches. It's hard to pretend to be someone you're not when your whole world is being threatened. ''How did you - ''

''You and me, kiddo,'' Crowley grabs Dean's face in his hands roughly. ''We don't have secrets.'' He pulls back, takes a step away, and when Dean whirls around, he's gone. Always has to make a good entrance and an even better exit, doesn't he? Melodramatic fucker.

Dean scrubs a hand over his face and tries to calm his erratic breathing. ''Okay,'' his voice is brittle. Something inside of him threatens to burst. ''Okay. Shit. Fuck.'' He squeezes his eyes shut. ''Get it together, Dean. You're a goddamn demon.'' When he opens his eyes, they're back to black. He breathes in deep. The world is full of colors. Stick to the plan, asshole.

Hey.

Do you know what else he has learned?

He is powerful. He is more powerful than Crowley, more powerful than Abbadon, hell, he's willing to bet he's even more powerful than Lillith was. He hadn't been expecting that. He knows Crowley hadn't been expecting that. He is not some average, run of the mill demon. He is not a mindless killing machine who can be used as some weapon. The mark on his arm isn't some poorly thought out tattoo. He is the new Cain. That means something. Dean moves back over to the ledge and steps up onto it. He watches her through the window, comforted by her glow and the way she moves and the fact that she is obviously very much alive.

You see, right now, Dean Winchester is a supernova.

He may be burning bright right now but sooner rather than later, he will fade. He can feel it. It's like there's a timer in his body, ticking down the days, the minutes, the seconds, until he fades from view. There will be no coming back from this one. And that's okay. That's good. He is ready to go. Wherever he ends up - Heaven, Hell, Purgatory - he is ready for it. The world is so much better off without him, trust him on that one. Sam has made it clear that the weight of his older brother is what's shackling him down and causing his unhappiness, so without Dean, without that weight, maybe he can finally be happy. Laurel will be safe, far away from the supernatural world, the one that got her possessed and traumatized. Cas can worry about his own life, instead of having to constantly pull Dean out of trouble.

He won't even have a chance to turn his kid to ashes. Thank God for that. He hopes that kid grows up hating the thought of him, wanting to be anything but him, and refusing to be a part of the Winchester legacy. He's okay with that. The world needs more Lances. It does not need more Winchesters. That's the way it has to be.

But let's make one thing abso-fucking-lutely clear.

He is taking Crowley with him.

Crowley has been a thorn in his side for years. He wrecked Cas, took Bobby's soul, forced one of his demon lackeys to possess Laurel and nearly killed her, he used Dean as a weapon to kill Abbadon, and now he has her. There is no reason for Crowley to still be breathing.

Dean is going to dismantle his entire organization piece by piece from the inside until there is nothing left, he's going to save her and get her out of Crowley's clutches, he's going to stab the First Blade through that bastard's neck, and then he'll put it through his own charred and useless heart. Blaze of glory. Just like he's always wanted. And nobody's going to save him this time. They're not going to want to. He'll make sure of that.

His lips quirk into a half smile as he watches Laurel stop in her tracks, undoubtedly sensing eyes on her. She turns around and looks right at him. He remains rooted to the ground for a second, taking in the faraway sight of her face, her eyes, her mouth, and then, when she walks towards him, he backs away, slinking back into the shadows. She'll hate him by the end of this. Good. Dean turns his back on Laurel and walks away. He doesn't look back.

His mother told him once, hands warm against his skin, You are my little angel.

The demon laughs.

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Forget the dragon
Leave the gun on the table
This has nothing to do with happiness

RICHARD SIKEN | LITANY IN WHICH CERTAIN THINGS ARE CROSSED OUT

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end chapter four

---

AN: Remember in 1x09 when Quentin called Laurel 'D' because Dinah Laurel Lance and then that nickname just disappeared along with the rest of Arrow's potential? I'M BRINGING IT BACK.

IMPORTANT NOTE: Sadly, friends, this will be the last chapter of 2014. I'm heading out for the holidays next week and I won't be back until January. The next update will either be on Friday, January 16th or Friday, January 23rd. ...Probably more likely to be the 23rd.

I hope everyone has a happy and and safe holiday season and HAPPY NEW YEAR!
Love to you all! :)

- Becks