The new nightmares have been going on for weeks and intensifying with every passing day. The usual affair mixed in of course - becoming his father - but now they are becoming increasingly plagued by a growing regret rather than the usual fear that has haunted him since he was eleven. As his worry about Ainsley grows - first of her being caught, and now the worry of her possibly not being the little sister he grew up with, the person he thought he knew - so do the frequency and intensity of nightmares.

The restraints dig into his wrists as he jolts awake, arms stretched out in front of him, reaching. The motion leaving indents on his wrists that last for most of his morning routine, as physical reminders of what he failed to do. He failed to pull the trigger, failed to stop Ainsley from making a mistake that might cost her her life, that might cost all of them their lives in the end.

The nightmare was always the same.

Nicolas Endicott in mother's sitting room that night.

His own hand shaking, both with his fist around the gun, and before he had even reached for it.

"You really are your mother's son, Malcolm. All smoke. No fire."

Nicolas bragging about how untouchable he was. How he was going to destroy his and Ainsley's family, starting with their mother.

And when Nicolas understood he was still as untouchable as he claimed, because Malcolm couldn't pull the trigger - then came the moment that had haunted him so deeply that he was trapped, as if in a "groundhog day" of those five minutes every time he closed his eyes to sleep. Not that sleep had ever been a respite from his troubled mind. But his mind had reached a whole new level of trouble that night. On top of the Ainsley of it all, he wrestled with the part of him his father was so eager to nurture. "You and I are the same" being a constant echo behind all his other thoughts.

Endicott stabbed Gil, had Eve killed, and forced many like Sophie to do his dirty work. He knew that Nicolas wasn't lying about using and destroying the Whitlys. He was ruthless, corrupt and utterly without morals. He absolutely deserved to be brought to justice. But not this kind. Not the kind that brought Ainsley closer to their father, that could be the start of a transformation within her, one that would pull her away from mother and himself.

Then the moment his sleeping arms reach out to stop comes. The action that his scream, muffled by his mouth guard, tries to prevent.

"The whole system is mine. I own it. I can do anything I want."

Ainsley steps up behind Nicolas, knife in hand, with a look in her eyes he has never seen in his sister. One that scares him.

He himself is frozen in shock, unable to process what is happening, let alone do anything to stop it.

Weeks ago he was only able to watch Ainsley kill Endicott over and over. Last week he found he is able to try to stop it. Maybe he has lived the moment over enough in his nightmares that his unconscious mind, bored of the monotony, has began allowing him to try to fix things.

He reaches forward to dissuade her, catch her attention, scream her name to wake her from the trans-like state she is in. And finally he tries to reach forward for her hands. Knock the knife from his sister's iron grip.

He's never successful - always too late. But every night he tries, as if it would ease his conscience. As if this wishful thinking his unconscious mind creates nightly was an alternate universe he could one day escape to - to live in a "before" rather than "after."

"Before" - characterized by an intense fear of being like The Surgeon, the uncertainty of his childhood memories, and that feeling of being other and a freak. "After" in turn is characterized by the knowledge that he has committed a crime and gotten away with it; dismembered and disposed of a body, being worried about his sister, having to lie to his work family, and worst of all: wrestling with the tiny part of himself who actually likes parts of "after."