You guys are amazing. I have reviews on here maybe an hour after I post a new chapter . . . maybe an hour. I can't believe anyone likes my work this much. Now, if only I could write original ideas as well as I do fanfiction . . .

Hey, I'm not complaining.

But be warned, this chapter is a tad harsh. Well, Kirbee told me to make it tragic, so . . .

Enjoy!

K.S.

Barton came to find Erian after Indonesia.

She hated Indonesia. Not that she'd known that before they went, but she knew it now, and promised herself she would never go back. Not ever.

It was the girl that broke Erian. The little red-head with blue eyes who had been standing on the street corner, the one holding the ragged teddy bear. The one who had been shot by their target as he fled the inevitable. The little girl with bright blue eyes that had slowly faded as she lay dying in a puddle of her own blood.

That's what had broken Erian. She'd held it together until they made it home, hung on to her shattered pieces and her ragged edges, and then when she closed the door behind her, she came apart entirely.

Barton found her on the flight deck, backed into the smallest possible gap between bulkheads. Erian had a knife in her hand, a small switchblade with a worn, tape-wrapped handle. She had a roll of masking tape with her, and was very slowly wrapping another layer of tape around the knife's handle, pausing occasionally to slit the tape so that the knife would be able to close.

Her eyes were shut, but they opened when Barton crouched down in front of her. He could see traces of tears on her face, and Erian's hands were shaking as they moved.

"Erian."

She didn't answer. She just kept wrapping tape around the knife's handle, not so much as to make it bulky, just enough to replace the worn out layers beneath. Maybe tape was all that held the handle together. Maybe denial was all that held her together.

"Erian."

Stop saying my name.

"Erian, look at me."

She almost, almost killed him then. Almost lunged forward with the knife in her hand, almost buried the blade in his chest, almost ended his voice forever, almost made it the last time he would say her name.

Almost. Almost.

Erian looked at Barton, and didn't say anything. He moved a little deeper into the tiny alcove, jamming himself in next to her. It really wasn't big enough for two people, but then, the lack of space forced her to acknowledge that someone else existed in her present – that there was more in the world than her past.

Barton said, "It's Kirbee, isn't it?" and she nearly slapped him. He did it on purpose, Erian knew he did. It was shock treatment, to get her to pay attention.

Which was the only reason she didn't slap him. If Barton had forgotten that he wasn't supposed to say that name, she would have hit him hard enough to put him back in the med bay.

But Erian just bowed her head and closed the knife, putting the tape away and holding on tight to the worn-out handle.

I was just carrying it to look cool. To bring it out and flash it around for a few seconds, to go with the leather jacket and the tough talk and the cropped hair with the pink streak. I was a rebel. I was cool. I hung out with the senior boys, the motorcycle guys. I was just carrying it to look cool.

I was never going to use it. Never. I didn't even know if it was sharp. I bought it from a pawn shop. I had no idea that –

That Kirbee –

When she met me that night, she said she knew what I'd done. I knew that she knew. I knew that I couldn't let her tell. I had to have the lead, I had to –

I didn't mean to –

"I killed her, Clint," Erian whispered, and realized that she'd said it all out loud. She closed her eyes, and felt Barton pull her into him, felt him stroke her hair. Erian buried her face in his chest, and didn't cry.

"I killed her," she said again, voice muffled in his shirt. "I stabbed her. I didn't mean to. It was an accident. And there was blood, blood everywhere, all over her and the knife and not a drop on me. Not a single drop."

Barton made a sound in his throat, and Erian felt a sort of choking rising in her chest. She stammered out her words, panicked, needing to get the story out before it destroyed her.

"I – I knew what to do. I watched TV, after all. After all. I knew what to do. I took the knife. I'd been wrapping the handle with tape before she got there, because that's what the bad guys do, so there aren't fingerprints. I still had the tape. I wrapped up the handle, and I put the knife in my pocket and threw the tape in a dumpster. I ran. Clint, I ran, I left her there all alone, all alone in the meadow in the middle of the night, where anything could have happened to her –"

Erian made a sort of sobbing noise. "Nothing happened," she whispered. "Nothing happened. She was dead. Nothing happened to her. And I ran."

Barton said quietly, "You disappeared. Didn't they look for you?"
She knew what he was doing. He wanted her to tell him all of it, to get it out of her, so it wouldn't fester. Like an infection. She had to get rid of it, all of it.

So she did.

"They did look. They looked for Erian Monroe."

Erian felt that sink into his mind, felt his arm tighten around her. "I'm so sorry," she whispered. "I didn't mean to."

Barton didn't say anything, and that made all the difference in the world.