Notes from Mama Lobster: Sorry for the hiatus. I recently learned that if you are going to write a stupidly long fanfiction, you should probably keep track of all your chapters in some organized fashion. They tend to escape otherwise...

Happy Christmas everyone. Named for Tori Amos

Winter

You fight more viciously that you ever have before. You vow to rest his head on platter fashioned from the rest of his bones. You would never understand. She is alone and afraid. She is beyond anyone's help now.

== Dave: Wake

The panic is starting to cease, as Dave is finally able to get air into his lungs after 47 seconds of dry heaving and wails. His eyes are burning and his chest is tight, but he is safe and home again, and he needs to get his bearings.

Dave doesn't wake in fear so often anymore, but tonight is different. Tonight he remembers.

What do you remember?

He knows it is a memory. He knows it is a lost timeline, he can smell and feel and sense everything just like he can with every other memory, and it haunts him. He would be used to this by now, except this is not a memory he has ever had before.

And holy fuck does he wish he never had it.

He needs to find Jade.

Jade is huddled in a spring, her knees curled into her chest to shield her body from view. You try your hardest to pretend you don't notice, because you just don't know what to do. Her dress is soaked and she is shaking so violently. It's too hot for her in there, but she doesn't care.

Dave feels the bed next to him before remembering that Jade doesn't stay there every night. He needs a phone. He needs to find her right the fuck now before he starts looking for Gamzee.

She keeps scratching through the thin fabric of her shirt. You try to hold her still, but she pleads for you to let her go. She needs to be clean of this, and the hot water is never enough. Even as the blood clings to her fingernails she continues.

You can't watch. You can't do anything at all. You retreat to Lohac and cover your eyes to hide.

Dave's legs give out beneath him as he tries to get out of bed. He doesn't have time for this, where the fuck is his phone?

In 1.9 seconds he is steady on his feet. The nausea is still there, and he briefly wonders if he's going to retch again. The blood in his veins screams for chemical relief and he bites his tongue to hold it back.

John and Rose are at a loss. The game never prepared them for this, and being brave and fighting on is not enough. The timeline is set for success. Jade still plays, and plays well. That's not the problem.

The problem is how she jumps when they talk to her, how her eyes go blank when she's with them and they know she's somewhere else. You still believe that as long as she is alive that she can pull herself together, she'll recover and they will be able to carry on as a team.

Rose doesn't seem as sure.

The phone is on his bedside table, and he scrambles for it in desperation. He doesn't want to remember any more, but he can't stop without Jade here.

Right on cue another wave of craving hits. He wants a line so badly it hurts. He has to keep those nails down; he knows he can't get started. If he starts scratching now he won't be able to stop. He's clean, he remembers. He has to stay that way or she won't talk to him. He has to be there for her this time.

Noir is upon them without warning, and John and Rose are far away on quests of their own. You can do this, though. Noir won't hurt Jade. You can duck behind her, using her as a shield, and you put up one hell of a fight. Together, you might have been a match for him.

Noir likes to fight dirty, though.

Dave fumbles with the phone, dialing in the darkness. The bright, digital clock blinks at him mockingly. If he couldn't control time, then Jade…

Maybe there's still some oxy in the cupboard. Shit, no. He feels like crying from frustration, but no tears will come.

He isn't hurting her, not physically. You are pinned under the weight of your own broken bones, and Noir has forsaken you. Noir has better plans, though you cry with a broken voice for him to listen.

He trails a claw down her face, wiping away her tears. She begs for him to remember who he is, that he loves her, that once she trusted him above all others. She begs him not to break that trust.

He doesn't listen.

You shout once more for him to finish the job himself, but he doesn't care. She promises that there's nothing he can do to make it worse.

There's nothing else he needs to do. His existence, his fake compassion, his mocking nuzzle to her as he forces her to shoot you is enough.

He hears Jade's ringtone from somewhere in the apartment. Is that good or bad? She's close, maybe. He runs towards the noise, falling for .7 seconds as he struggles to get his knees under control.

She wants to sleep next to you that night, and after weeks of her silence and isolation, you are thrilled. She even lets you hold her, sighing gently into the sheets. She's warm against your skin, and all you can think of is how close you are to the girl who always seemed so far away. She smiles as she curls up by your side, and you could almost laugh you are so happy.

Jade is on the couch, covered in a blanket. He's so fucking happy, he doesn't know what the fuck he would do if he couldn't find her right exactly the fuck now. With trembling fingers he touches her lips, her hair, her hands. She's ok. She's dreaming of something wonderful, he hopes, listening to her even breath. He loves how warm she is.

There is dead weight on you when you wake in the morning. Icy, cold, dead weight. Jade is still and frozen solid, a smile etched on her face. You don't need to see the toxic bottle in her hands to know what she has done.

You don't care how well it was going. You can't do this timeline anymore.

== Be Dave

In therapy, you learn a lot of new words. "Repressed memory" is one you hear a lot. A memory that is so unhealthy that your mind rejects it. Yeah, that sounds about right.

Jade woke in the night and was afraid for you when really you should have been afraid for her. She had been through so much, and in her lowest moment you couldn't even see that she needed help.

You thought she was fucking HAPPY. You child.

She wrote you a note full of all kinds of sappy nonsense, how she loved you all along and you shouldn't blame yourself, she just blah blah blah. You failed her. You let her get hurt again and again and again, you hurt her yourself, and every time you just ran away and let her deal with her problems on her own.

She looks so happy to see you when you get home, but all you can see is her face as Noir took her hands. A blank face, tear stained and bruised … fuck, you were all just kids. Small and shaken and so very, very vulnerable.

You don't deserve to have her smile at you.

She doesn't know what happened, because it never did for her. But it did happen. You know it happened. Somewhere Jade is still dead, and you absconded from that timeline like the coward that you were. John and Rose were left to fade off, and you couldn't even bring yourself to cope with your failures.

You are disgusted with yourself. What else haven't you noticed? What makes you think that you ever knew anything about her, or about being a good partner and a supportive husband?

This Jade doesn't understand, but you know that she doesn't need to. She should never, ever have to and you will die a thousand times over to make sure she never will again.

But it's you who doesn't understand. You know this, deep down. You could always help her fight, you could help her if she died or found herself doomed. She doesn't need your help to fight, though. She can save herself. She needs you to hear her, and that's something that, in all the years you have been married, you've never done.

You can never understand what happened to that version of Jade. She's lost. She's out of your reach, and all the questions you should have asked, everything you should have known, are all gone. All you can do is make it up to another girl with slightly better luck.

Repressed memory you think. A memory so unhealthy your mind rejects it.

Your mind is a coward, just like the rest of you.