I disclaim!

XXXXXX

"I think I'm going to die," Birkhoff stated.

"As opposed to your previous state of immortality when that wasn't going to happen eventually?" Michael couldn't help but retort.

Birkhoff slowly turned to face Michael, "Did you seriously just say that? I can't believe you just said that."

Michael sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose out of frustration, "What did she get?I don't have time for your existential crisis."

"It wasn't really existential."

Michael just stared at him expectantly. "Well?"

Birkhoff sighed, "You know how I just said I wanted to die?"

"You said you were going to die. Bit of a difference there. Point, please."

"What crawled up your ass and died?" Birkhoff mumbled just loud enough for Michael to hear.

Michael rolled his eyes, "I have a bump the size of a golfball on my head. I'm sorry if I'm not being friendly enough for you." Birkhoff would forgive him, they were friends . . . of a sort.

Birkhoff frowned. "I think both of my previous statements are accurate."

"What's going on?"

Birkhoff hesitated before answering, "Shadownet is down."

"I'm sorry, what did you just say?" Michael felt his headache intensify. "Isn't it supposed to be, in your words here, "perfect" . . . what happened to that?"

Birkhoff slammed his head down on the table in front of him. "She's good, Michael. She—she's not better than me, but she caught me off-guard. I might be able fix it, but I'll probably have to redo it from scratch. And as far as I can tell, she's put in safeguards to make sure that that I can't reconnect most of what we could before. It's going to take some time to fix."

Michael sighed, "When did she get the opportunity and access to do all of this?"

"I have no idea. It was Percy's idea to see what she could do with Shadownet . . . and most of it seems to have crashed in on itself within the last few hours though, which means . . . " he trailed off.

"Which means we have a problem," Michael finished.

Birkhoff nodded, "Big problem." He hesitated. "I think she was working with Nikita."

Michael closed his eyes. He hadn't intended to tell anyone about his little "conversation" about Nikita, and he wasn't going to change his mind now. But Birkhoff was no fool, and he already knew Chloe and Nikita were connected. "You're right. She must have been the leak to Nikita. Finally, things can get back to normal now that she's gone."

Brikhoff snorted at that, "Not likely. She's screwed us over. Normal just went out the window for at least a while."

"Just great." For a brief moment Michael wished someone would just knock him out again. The next words he heard solidified that wish.

"What's great?" Percy walked in at that moment. "What's going on?"

Michael turned, "Do you want to tell him," he nodded at Percy, "Or should I?"

Birkhoff looked like he actually wanted to die, which was quite uncharacteristic. Then again, him being this unlucky was pretty damn uncharactertistic. "Um, you."

XXXX

Chloe finally reached Nikita's hideout and sighed with relief. She really just wanted to sleep for about a thousand years. She'd had to stop along her way back to make sure she'd triggered most of her Shadownet traps, but now she was tired.

And there was a part of her that was worried that Nikita would have already contacted Oliver— and she really couldn't handle him right now.

She couldn't really handle anything right now. She walked into the large open space where most of Nikita's tech was located and was happy to see it empty. She saw a bed in the corner and she wandered over to it.

So tired. She decided to lie down—or, well, her body did because it quite frankly had decided to give out on her at that moment. She was so ready for this to be over, but there was still a lot to do.

Chloe swore she was so tired she couldn't fall asleep—if that were possible anyway, which she rather thought it was. Because, well, she was experiencing it.

Too tired to sleep. That sounded ridiculous.

Chloe tried to focus in on her plans—because this wasn't the end, this was just the beginning.

They still had to break back into Division, storm the castle so to speak.

And they still had to hunt down the rest of the black boxes—though she conveniently had locations for most of them, though not all.

Just lovely.

And she still had to face Oliver soon—something she both desperately wanted to do, and was terrified of.

She missed him. But she also realized that she'd hurt him when she'd left, even though she'd done it because it was necessary.

It had torn her apart to do things the way she had, but there had been no other choice.

She would make it up to him, she promised herself as her body finally gave up and she fell asleep.

XXXX

Oliver walked down into the room after taking a shower—Nikita jumped in after him, suggesting that she did her best thinking while submerged in water, which he'd found amusing, but he'd chosen not to comment on it.

Oliver sighed. This was going to be stressful.

He walked into the room and was surprised to see a balled up person on the bed in the corner. He walked closer, his heart pumping.

"Chloe," he whispered. She didn't stir, she was obviously deeply asleep.

He hurried the rest of the way to her, kneeling next to the bed. He lifted his hand to her cheek, stroking it with his thumb.

It had been so long since he'd seen her, he wanted to just glory in her. He could stare at her for hours.

It had been so long since he'd last touched her, he just cupped her face with his hand, feeling tears well up at the corner of his eyes. He missed her.

And every wound he'd felt because of her leaving seemed to explode back open, full force.

He'd wanted to believe that they'd gotten to the point where there weren't secrets, and where Chloe could be completely honest with him.

There was no reason she couldn't have come back to him after faking her death. There was no reason she couldn't have contacted him sooner than this.

She should have trusted him.

He removed his hand, stopping his stroking motion. He leaned forward and kissed her forehead.

As she was asleep, it was okay, but as soon as she woke up, he'd see the look in her eyes, the smile on her lips . . . and he couldn't handle that.

He couldn't handle her apologies, or anything else.

He loved her, and it hurt him.

She hurt him.

He didn't know if he could get over that.

In the meantime he just stared at her, unable to move his eyes from her face, or from tracing the outline of her body.

He still missed her, even though she was right in front of him. He couldn't connect to her, he couldn't yell at her for being such a damn fool, and he couldn't—he couldn't look away.

XXXX

When Nikita walked in and saw the two of them she was instantly worried. Chloe shouldn't have been here. Nikita walked quietly over to her computer, she needed to talk to Alex. Oliver didn't move at the noise she made.

Nikita felt a pang in her heart at seeing the reunited lovers. She hoped they would figure things out, because they fit together in a lovely sort of way. That, of course, was the least of her problems though, and not even really her problem.

She logged onto her computer, trying to ignore her own pain.

Michael was still furious with her for stopping him from getting revenge on the man who'd killed his wife and daughter, and he could quite possibly never forgive her for that.

Oh, how she missed him!

She forced down her feelings. Things would never be the same between them, and there was nothing she could do about that.

There'd been a time where they'd been happy—though apart, of course, because Division wouldn't allow them to have a romantic relationship—but it hadn't lasted long. They'd been friends.

And she'd been in love with him, though she'd never said it aloud. And he'd loved her, she'd thought, but he'd never said it either. They couldn't have said the words.

Then she'd fallen for Daniel—sweet, kind, lovely Daniel, and he'd died because she'd loved him. She didn't think she could ever forgive herself, or Michael, for that. And as she desperately worked to take down Division, Michael worked to take her down.

And in the meantime, whenever she saw him she died a little inside. The look on his face—almost always of pain—broke her heart. It was just the way things were, and there was no going back from it.

Nikita sighed when she saw that Alex wasn't online. Oh well. It was a worry for another day now.

XXXX

Alex hadn't really liked Chloe at first, but after realizing she was a genuinely caring person, she'd somewhat changed her opinion.

But really, the reason why Alex loved Chloe right now was the mess she'd left behind at Division. Everyone was running around like chickens with their heads cut off.

It was hilarious.

Alex was highly amused by the chaos Chloe had caused, and she tried to hide it. She realized that she needed to have a reason for her great mood, so when Thom had quirked an eyebrow and asked her why she seemed to be in such good spirits she'd lied, obviously, "I never liked Chloe, you know that. It's nice to be vindicated."

Thom had smiled slightly at that, "I wouldn't be so happy if I were you, it's dangerous, especially when things are such a mess."

Alex leaned in slightly, grabbing a napkin to hand to Thom. She smiled, "I'll try to take that under advisement," she laughed as Thom failed terribly at managing to clean up the mess he'd made of his face. She grabbed the napkin back, "Here," and she wiped it away, a small smudge of sauce near his mouth. Upon realizing where her hand was, she dropped it suddenly back down towards her own side of the table.

"Thanks." Thom looked at her in confusion. "Alex, I—"

Alex smiled brightly, "So, Thom. What do you know about this craziness? Did they catch her?" Alex didn't want to hear what Thom was going to say next, she didn't think she could handle the look that had been on his face anymore. There'd been a hint of yearning in his eyes, and she just—she couldn't handle that.

"I don't know," Thom replied. He scrunched his nose up in a way that made Alex a little weak in the knees because of how absolutely adorable it was. "But if they had . . . I think they'd be a little less stressed."

Alex managed to not smile at that. "Too bad," and she looked back down at her food.

Man, she was hungry for real food. Or, well, not-real food. Fast food. Chocolate. Anything other than this. It kind of felt like prison, but with slightly better tasting food. Alex briefly wondered about the kind of people who prepared their meals.

That was interesting. Some people ended up being guards, and others were legit agents. And wouldn't it just suck to get put on kitchen duty? She snorted at that, and upon seeing the questioning look on Thom's face explained her thought process to him.

She loved that he laughed, and not at her either.

God, she loved him.

Alex shook herself free of her reverie, and finished her breakfast. She needed to report to Nikita soon—hopefully, anyway, if Chloe hadn't ruined even those systems.

It was going to be a long day.