Now…

Nicky doesn't even think about it.

Her fist catches Bourne across his lower jaw, and his head snaps back; she might be shorter and smaller, but Nicky can hit hard. It's a lucky shot because Bourne wasn't expecting it from her; no one else would have caught him unprepared. But in the time it takes her to pull back and take a breath, she's slammed up against the closed armoire door. His hands are wrapped around her crossed wrists, hard and punishing against her chest.

A grunt of pain escapes and Nicky is furious. He has her pressed so hard against the armoire she can barely draw breath; but that fulcrum is all she needs to lift both feet, kicking at his shin with her right foot, smashing his other knee with her left. He buckles and Nicky slams her forehead into his chin. Bourne snarls, again caught off guard; Nicky snaps out of his hold and swings again, narrowly missing a good punch to his side because he pulls back swiftly, instinctively.

She knows something he doesn't; and she presses her attack. The faint lights outside provide all the illumination they need as they tumble across the small room, growls punctuating the strikes and blocks. A flurry of jabs and kicks are easily deflected; she forces Bourne back a few steps but it's laughable. She learned from the same fighting instructors he did; but there are light years of difference in their techniques and skill levels. Yet even though he could easily snap her neck, kill her in innumerable ways, he doesn't. He's holding back, defensive rather than offensive. She can sense his surprise, his confusion that he won't finish her. That he can't.

How's that working for you, motherfucker? she taunts silently. The brief revel is overshadowed by an accompanying pang. You were right, David. If we hadn't done it, I'd be dead now.


Then….

"David."

She calls to him softly, from the foot of the bed. It's the safest place for her to be when he's in the throes of a nightmare, when he's so subsumed by nocturnal terror that he might not know who she is when he wakes, and strike out defensively.

Of course she can fight back; but even her highly advanced combatives skills are laughable compared to his. It wouldn't take much for him to snap a wrist, break an arm, or cause even more serious damage before he woke from a dream-induced haze. It's happened before: they were lucky he only broke her index and middle fingers last time when she'd reached out drowsily to touch him. The nightmares have become more frequent and more sustained in the last few months. She's afraid it's a break in his conditioning, wonders if the other assets are experiencing similar problems. None of them have told her about nightmares, but they're all so paranoid they probably wouldn't. She debriefs them, runs assessments; but they're so clever, they can find their way around any question. She wonders about the new drugs that have been administered. What aren't they (all) being told by their superiors?

But she also wonders if the break in programming isn't because of the experiment she's been running at Bourne's insistence.

They've been lovers now for nearly six months and both of them know it's a matter of time before they are discovered. They do not meet at her flat or at his. They have a private studio in a quiet corner of Montparnasse, rented under a false identity. They deploy every tactic of spycraft when they rendezvous in between his assignments. But they know it's when, not if, they are found out. Which is why David insisted that she secretly implement a special program, training a particular response where she is concerned.

"It's for your safety, Nicky," he'd said when he'd first asked her to develop the new protocol.

She had refused, insisted that this was a dangerous endeavor. He had been equally adamant, demanding that she comply with his request.

"You administer the drugs for them, you oversee our psychological health. You've been trained to do this. For fuck's sake, your entire senior thesis was built on this. You have to do this."

He didn't need to say out loud what they already knew: if Conklin or Treadstone's superiors deemed Nicky an impediment to the machinery that is Jason Bourne, they wouldn't hesitate to burn her. And they wouldn't be above making him kill her as a means to reinforce his conditioning.

Ultimately she'd given in. And now she wonders if she should have. But she can't bring up his nightmares with her superiors – because if it is the result of her tampering, and not something happening universally to the others – she and Bourne will have exposed themselves.

He sits up swiftly, the sheet sliding down around his waist, his bare chest heaving. He is coated with sweat and he stares at her, blue eyes panicked. He's gasping, as if drowning. She wants nothing more than to rush to him, take him in her arms and comfort him. But he's not himself yet. There's neither recognition or awareness in those blank eyes, just terror.

"David," she repeats quietly.

His head swivels towards the sound of her voice but those dark blue eyes remain blind to her. Nicky's hands tighten on the wrought iron bar of the bed frame. This is the part she hates the most, where the intersection of dream and reality begin to slowly diverge and the emptiness in his eyes linger, the killer that is his Bourne identity in charge. She waits for the unblinking, shark-like darkness in those eyes to eventually warm, to recognize her.

The transformation is so subtle: when Jason Bourne gives way to David Webb, there's no tension in the way he holds his head, as if alert and listening for every sound around him; there is a slackening around the jaw, so it is not tense and rigid; and David's eyes are wide and open, not narrowed in focus.

And when David Webb looks at her, there is utter and complete trust, maybe even love.

"Nicky." Her name is a sigh, an exhalation. And Nicky starts to breathe again, as she does every time he recognizes her. He slumps forward, breathing hard. "Come here."

She doesn't comply immediately, padding over to the floor-to-ceiling double windows which lead out to the balcony. The Hausmannian flat is not big, a mere 48 square meters; but it is lovely and secret, overlooking a quiet avenue. Cool air fills the room, the soft wind a pleasant brush against her naked body.

David sits with his arms draped loosely around his knees, his head bent. His breathing is no longer rapid and shallow. In the light cast by the moon, she can see he is still trembling though. She approaches slowly, reaching for the pitcher of water on the night stand, pouring him a glass.

"Here," she says softly.

He lifts his head, takes the glass from her, downing the water quickly, placing the empty glass back on the table. His hand brushes against her hip, fingers spanning the graceful curve as he pulls her toward him. Nicky moves slowly, looking down at him, brushing his damp hair away from his face. He turns toward her, wrapping his arms around her, pressing his face into her stomach, inhaling deeply, as if the scent of her is what he needs to maintain his sanity. Maybe it is.

"It's getting worse, David," she whispers fearfully, stroking his hair.

He doesn't answer, just holds her tighter. It borders on pain, that death grip. But she doesn't protest, doesn't pull back.

"What can we do?" she asks, even though she knows he has no answers.

He turns his head, his cheek pressing against the flat of her stomach, his breath fanning across the sensitive skin. He moves his head slightly, as if shaking his head.

"David, no one else is having nightmares," she tells him. "It doesn't mean they're not, but what if…what if our protocol is affecting your conditioning, causing problems?"

He pulls away from her, looks up, his eyes troubled but his features gentle, loving. "It's not a problem if I can never hurt you," he says unequivocally.


Now…

It's when her eyesight is completely blurred, when she can't see anything that Nicky stops punching him; and she realizes she's crying. And fuck, she is mad that she's so goddamned weak. She, who has come this far on her own; the keeper of secrets for Conklin and Abbott and Vosen and Landy; the deceiver of those same, who has swallowed lies and buried truths, who has unintentionally or willingly sent people to their deaths just to protect this man. She drops to her knees and crouches on the ground while her former lover looms over her. Her bruised fists dig into her thighs as tears slide down her cheeks. She struggles, and fails, to contain her wracking sobs.

The glue and tape holding Nicky Parsons together shreds, and she cries the way she's wanted to since the night he no longer recognized her, when he took Conklin and her hostage in the Treadstone safehouse. She holds her shaking sides, desperate to stretch out on the floor and simply howl. But it's humiliating and infuriating enough that she's weeping wildly at his feet, her control in splinters.

Bourne does not move, does not lean down to touch her, or offer comfort. He keeps the strip of distance between their bodies, but surprisingly, he does not leave. And when it's over and she's spent, so tired, she finally rocks back on her heels and looks up at him.

In the half light, she can barely make out his features, but her mind can fill in those hewn features, those enigmatic blue eyes.

When he speaks, the words are low. "That's four times now that I haven't ended your life." He pauses, then marvels, "I can't kill you."

It's not a question.

"No."

"Who are you?" he rasps.

To me?

That subtext lingers between them.

"No one." Nicky utters a choked sound that could be a partial laugh, or a sob. "Fucking no one."