A/N: Here's the next update hope that you all enjoy, please take a second to hit the review button and let me know what you think about the story good or bad I would love to know this one has really be a challenge to write.

Chapter 9: Threads

Abby emerged from the bedroom later that morning about a half hour after Carter had left. She knew that someone else was there; she had heard Carter's voice in the kitchen earlier talking to someone. The voice was one that she knew and at the time hadn't startled her; in fact she had laid back down and gone back to her sleep. When she finally did emerge she slowly for her feet felt as if they were dunked in cement.

Her eyes were glazed over and her look was one that scared Susan half to death. There before her stood a woman who looked possessed by something, pale and shaking as if scared for her life, her eyes were empty as if the life had been sucked right out of her. That wasn't the Abby that Susan knew, that was not her Abby.

"Abby," Susan called out but there was no response from her. Abby turned towards her but looked right through Susan as if she wasn't there. As if someone had called her name but there was no one in the room with her.

"Abby honey." Susan said again, nothing but Abby's postured changed. Susan watched as she became more defensive with her stance as if there was someone standing behind Susan that was there to get her. "Abby honey it's Susan." She said again, but nothing with Abby changed, her eyes still had that empty look to them, her hand were still violently shaking now, and you could see the sweat running down Abby's pale face. Her cheeks were sunk in now and there were giant black circles under her eyes.

Abby looked now at the stranger standing in her apartment, "what do you want, why are you here." She said her voice was shaky filled with a fear that you could smell on the air. She took a step back away now retreating some unsure of why that person was in her apartment, of what they might want from her, she assumed that they were there to do her harm.

"Abby honey, it's Susan." She said looking at Abby, "I'm not here to do hurt you, I'm your friend remember." Susan didn't know what to make of Abby's now very odd behavior. "Carter went out to run some errands he asked me to stay with you, make sure that you're okay."

"You're lying to me." Abby said backing away even more. The hair on her arms stood up now as the fear she had been feeling for weeks completely had her in it's grasp and she could no longer break free from it. Abby's mind was no longer her own.

"No honey I'm not." Susan said trying to keep her tone soft and even with Abby as to not frighten the woman any more than she already was. "I'm the only one here and no one is going to hurt you I promise you that."

"Go, go away." Abby said backing into the table now as the lamp went crashing to the floor. The sound of it sent Abby skyrocketing in fear over sensitive to sounds and stimulation right now. She threw her hands up to cover her head in retaliation so that she wouldn't be hurt. "Don't, please dear god don't hurt me. I'll do whatever it is that you want just promise not to hurt me."

"I won't, I won't." Susan said as she took a step towards Abby, she needed to find a way to bring Abby back to the right reality. As Susan took that step forward Abby retreated from her even more.

Shards of glass from the broken lamp dug into her skin now as she tried desperately to get away from the person that was there with her. She didn't want to die and knew that this is what that person was intent on doing.

"Abby honey stop you're getting hurt." Susan said, with every step forward she took Abby took another one back and was in the middle of the broken lamp's mess. "Abby listen to me it's Susan. No one else is here you are safe and it's going to be okay."

There where tears streaming full force down her cheeks now and there was no getting away from this person; it wasn't Susan's voice that she was hearing now it was Paul's engrained in her memory the coldness that was spoken to her on the platform. The shards of broken lamp feeling like the knife digging into her back over and over again.

"Get away!" Abby cried out now as she reached for a larger piece of the broken lamp holding it between her and the advancing man that was there with her. "Get away, you are not going to hurt me." Her voice was loud thinking that someone on the platform would hear her and come and rescue her.

Susan took a step back now worried about what Abby might do with that glass if she didn't back off. She could tell that Abby no matter what she said or how she said it was not there with her, she had lost track of time, space and person. Susan wasn't trained to deal with someone having a psychotic episode and she was afraid that's what Abby was having now, a very serious emotional flashback, PTSD flashbacks weren't unheard of, this seemed a little more than that, but you never knew for sure. Everyone reacted differently to trauma.

There was no knock on the door to signal his arrival, and he had no idea what was going on behind that door when he finally got back, he could hear voices inside and thought for sure that it was just Abby and Susan talking. He thought that maybe Susan had finally got Abby to open up and talk a little. Carter had no idea that he was about to walk into the middle of a battlefield.

With the shard of glass firmly in her hand blood dripping from it where it had managed to slice her own skin open she heard the door open and then and there did she see the male figure standing there in the doorway, blocking her only route of escape. That man was the one that she had come to fear and he was now here to get her, there wasn't just one but there was two of him now in her mind and she needed to get out of there as fast as she could. She was not going to let him put her through that horrible pain a second time. She bolted as fast as she could and as she passed the man standing there, knowing who it was in her mind she shoved the glass as hard as she could, her only defensive weapon into his skin.

Abby looked down at her hand covered in bright red blood, she looked up now right into the eyes of Carter and she could see the color draining from his face. She had just stabbed him and he was dying right there in front of her. She watched as he slumped to the ground.

"No!" She screamed, "Oh god no someone help us please." She couldn't bare to have him die again on her, that first time in the trauma room was more than enough for her to bare. But yet here he was a second time dying and she couldn't stop it. The more she tried the more covered in blood she became. She started to cry, "I'm sorry Carter I'm sorry." She said over and over again knowing nothing was ever going to make it right. His eyes closed and she knew that everything she had tried had been futile.

"No," she screamed out now, she could feel her heart breaking into two on that very spot knowing that she had just done the worst act that she could have possibly done. She could feel the tears stinging her face as the started to fall and she covered her face just as quickly breaking into sobs, ones that racked her body, she was shaking from head to toe.

Carter and Susan just looked at each other unsure of what to make of her actions right now for neither of them had moved from where they stood, Carter in the doorway and Susan near the edge of the kitchen where she had stopped moving any closer to Abby. It took them both a few minutes and cautious glances between the two of them, she was falling apart at the seams and they both knew it. The only question that they didn't have an answer to right now was what mind frame she was in. Was she there with them or trapped in her visions. Hearing voices was one thing but Abby had lost touch with the reality that surrounded her. She was going to need intensive therapy the kind that Carter nor Susan would be able to give to her.