We have this week's episode of Nikita, Episode 13: Coup De Grace, to thank for this update! I thought it was a great episode! I was suddenly inspired and decided not to do homework and, yeah, it has been such fun! See, I just knew it. Michael lovves her. :P Anywho...enjoy! ^^

4. Second Chances

Nikita sat propped up in bed, her computer on her lap. She twirled a black pen in her fingers as she waited impatiently for Alex's reply.

"Thank God! Thought you were dead!" was her protégé's reply in the message box.

"I know," Nikita typed back. "I'm sorry. Took me longer to get to a computer than I thought." A week had passed and she had hardly noticed.

"You okay?" wrote Alex.

"Yes. Mending. Safe…thanks to a friend."

On the other end, Alex sighed over her keyboard and leaned her head against her hand. She had been so worried. She remembered the night that Michael and Thom returned from their mission, when she learned that her mentor and friend was possibly dead…

Desperate for information, she found Thom in the locker rooms, sitting on a bench by himself, his hair wet. He was wearing sweats and a white t-shirt.

"What are you doing? Did you take a shower?"

He looked up at her and she couldn't tell if he was happy or sad or even glad to see her, the latter part caused a strange sense of disappointment. What she could read, underneath the part confusion and part concern, was the turmoil in his eyes.

One thing she knew about Thom for certain was that he would suffer in silence no matter how much pain he was in.

"I was working out," he said.

She plopped down on the bench next to him. "Mission a success?"

"Yeah, yeah." He stood up. "Look, I can't really say much about it to you, Alex. I have to report to Michael, before I head home."

"Home?"

"Out." His eyes met hers and then away. "I'll see you later." His mouth clenched.

"Thom, wait." She put a hand on his arm before he could turn away. "Did you get her?" She tried for a vicious smile and knew by his expression it wasn't quite right. "Is that bitch dead yet?"

Thom swallowed. "Yeah. Yeah, we got her. She's gone, Alex."

She could hear Birkhoff's footsteps behind her and she sat up. Her elbow slipped on the table, causing her arm to fall forward across her keyboard and the shell program conveniently disappeared underneath her fingertips.

"Rise and shine morning glory," he said, his voice carrying across the room of silent recruits working at their computers. "Looks like sleeping beauty here has already finished her homework." He leaned close. "Is it easier to crack the codes when you're already a crack head?"

Across the aisle in front of her own computer, her hair in pigtails, Jaden snorted.

The rest of the recruits were silent, as they all glanced at her and Birkhoff, but Alex could still hear hands moving methodically across keyboards. Alex glanced up and Michael was at the railing, his eyes on her face.

She didn't flinch. "Some codes are just easy to crack than others," she told Birkhoff. She could practically feel Michael's smirk.

"Birkhoff," said Michael before the computer genius could form some sarcastic reply. "Percy wants to see you."

"Scatter eggheads!" called Birkhoff as he headed up the stairs.

A guard appeared at Michael's side then. The guard, all dressed in black, a gun on his hip, leaned in close and said something quietly in Michael's ear. With a tightening of his mouth, Alex watched as the two disappeared out of sight.

Michael crossed his arms as Amanda stood next to a medium size television. One of ten or so lined up against a wall in front of a large desk with three chairs. A man with long brown hair and black rimmed glasses sat in one of the chairs and chewed on the inside of his cheek.

"Percy said you wanted to see me," said Michael.

"Bring back any fond memories?" Amanda said as she gestured toward the TV's black monitor at her right.

Michael's jaw clenched. "What do you want Amanda?"

"Bernard."

The man at the desk pushed a button on the keyboard in front of him and the video on the TV showed Alex and Thom together in the locker room. Thom's head was in his hands as Alex sat next to him, her hand on his shoulder, her face very white. She looked like she was in pain.

"I didn't know we were spying daily on the recruits now," said Michael.

"Watch," said Amanda.

Michael watched in silence as Thom lifted his head out of his hands and Alex clutched her hand to her chest. Her body looked like it had turned to jelly as she slid off the bench and into a pool on the floor. Thom struggled to catch her as she collapsed. He gathered her up in his arms. She was shaking and what appeared to be sobbing. They watched in silence as Thom rocked her back and forth. Amanda turned off the television.

"She had another panic attack," said Michael. Bernard turned back to his keyboards and monitors, completely forgotten. "I thought you fixed her."

"You know their relationship. This is from several days ago. He was probably talking about your recent mission. Now, why would our young Alex have a panic attack just because she's learned that Nikita's dead?"

"You think she's the mole," said Michael. "Thom is a good agent. He wouldn't talk about missions."

"He also has weaknesses. Just like other men, he has weaknesses."

"Perhaps the closeness of the situation was too much for Alex, considering…"

"Alex doesn't have a problem with intimacy, she has a problem with control."

His expression didn't waver. "What about you Amanda? What's your problem?"

But he didn't wait for her reply as he stormed out of the security room. He didn't care. He didn't look back. Her face was cold and hard as the steel doors thundered heavily to a close behind him.

In his mind's eyes he saw her in that jail cell, dirty and alone. Her hair in straggles around her face, her eyes dead as they stared right through them. But there was something in them, something behind that glaze that told him those dark eyes could be something more and certainly were already.

"She'll do," he told the prison guard, aka part-time Division agent who'd given them the heads up. "Make the call to Percy."

When she woke up days later, supposedly dead, alone and angry, he knew he had been right. When she flew off the bed, punched him hard in the chest, kneed him in the groin, he knew. Even when he smelled her sweat, smelled the prison and drugs in her hair.

"You don't normally get a second chance at life," he had growled to her as he pinned her down on the floor with both hands. "So I'm only going to say this once, and you better listen closely. You do that again and I will kill you myself. That I can promise you."

Alex reminded him so much of Nikita. He thought about what she said to him the night that he and Thom had returned to Division for debriefing. The night when he was still trying to shake the blood off his hands. Nikita's blood.

He had found her in the training room by herself, working her body back and forth as she pummeled the bag with all her strength, but she was tiring herself out more than anything.

He folded his arms across his chest. "You'd get better results if you slowed down," he observed.

She shot him a glare. "What do you want?"

"It's after hours, Alex. You shouldn't be here."

"So, what are you going to do about it?"

He stared at her, noted her defiance, the fury in each hit to the punching bag. "Go to bed Alex, I'll give you about five minutes."

He didn't get far before he heard her voice behind him.

"You were in love with her, weren't you?"

He turned around, his eyes dark. "I gave you five minutes. I don't know what's going on with you Alex, but I'll give you another two to walk away."

"You liked it, didn't you?"

He knew it was coming before she did it. He deflected her fist with his arm and shot out with his own, but she turned to the side and kicked him in the chest. He grunted as he grabbed her ankle and twisted. She fell to the mat with a cry. She didn't get back up.

"It's never easy when someone you love dies," he said, his voice low, dangerous. He stood over her, where she lay crumpled on the mat. "I'm sure you out of all people would know that. Would appreciate how fragile second chances are."

"Michael I-"

He was surprised to see the tears in her eyes, but he didn't show it. "Now, you're going to tell me here and now why Nikita's death is so important to you and why that causes you pain."

Alex could hear the blood pounding in her ears as all of the life in her seemed to be sucked out of her and into the floor at her feet.

Alex's fingers raced across the keyboard later that day.

"I knew you had to be alive even before you contacted me," Nikita read Alex's message as she sat in bed, a spiral notebook open next to her computer. Her small laptop was propped up on her knees on her lap, her head bunched up behind three pillows. The window at the end of her bed was open, and she felt the cool breeze that stirred the thin white curtains on her face.

"Something in his face," the message continued. "It seemed hopeful."

Hopeful…thought Nikita. She supposed at one time, Michael had been that way.

"But you're okay," Nikita typed back. "You're safe?"

"I told him your name reminded me of an old family member's. He seemed to buy it. Amanda…not so much," was Alex's reply.

"Percy?"

"He doesn't seem to care."

"Don't underestimate him. He's more observant than he lets on."

Nikita's hand slipped on the keyboard. She thought she heard the sound of branches snapping. A car pulled into the driveway then in the house next to hers. She heard the loud chatter of kid's voices and the sound of many car doors opening and closing. The neighbors were home. Great. She'd been listening to them coming and going for the past few days. Who has time for five kids anyway? Her eyes returned to the computer screen.

"Noted," Alex had written. "What now?"

"Lay low. No more surprises. Does Michael trust you?"

"Yes."

"Good. Keep it that way." Her hand traced over the keys and then she heard the definite sound of a male's voice directly outside her window.

"Fuck," the voice said.

She dropped her laptop to the end of the bed and scrambled one armed for the gun in the drawer of her bedside cabinet. Her broken leg and arm were still healing, so she was a bit slow as she threw the blanket back and hobbled out of bed in her cast and nightshirt, her cast-less leg was bare. She tucked the gun behind her back as she leaned against the wall next to the open window.

There was the sound of branches scraping against the side of the house and then a blur—a body dressed all in black flew into the open window, rolled and then sprang to his feet. Nikita stepped forward and pressed the gun against the side of the man's head. "Hood down."

The man's hands quickly brushed back the hood, which hid his face and revealed—

"Owen?"

He couldn't help it, he grinned as her eyes met his. "We need to stop meeting this way." He felt cold metal press against his temple in response. "Whoa, relax, it's just me."

"Somehow that doesn't make me feel any better."

"I thought you were dead," he said.

"I was. For about a minute."

"How was it?"

"You tell me."

"I knew Michael would let you live," said Owen quickly. "I brought you a present."

"Did you kill Ari for me?"

"No."

"Must not be a very good present then."

"It's black."

Nikita's gun lowered and she slumped against the wall then, suddenly exhausted. Owen noticed the whiteness on her face, the clench of her mouth. She held her stomach like it would burst into a million pieces.

"Broken ribs too, huh?"

"Yeah," she gritted and hobbled back to bed. He tried to help her, but she pushed his arm away.

"That because of me?"

"Long story," she said as she pulled the blanket back across her legs. She set the gun on the bedside cabinet.

"Sorry."

"Yeah, me too."

"Care to tell it?"

"Have a seat," she gritted. She settled back into her pillows, slowly. "I'll tell you. But I want my present first."