Author's Note: Hi, Jeller fans! I'm kind of stumbling through everything in zombie mode at the moment, because of my health and the whole is-Blindspot-cancelled situation, but I managed to get this one written. Here's hoping we get some (good) season five news soon, despite the situation with NBC, and it'll light a fire under my ass! Thank you, as always, for your kind words.

"Why didn't you tell me that Borden was one of us?" were the first words out of Jane's mouth when she got into Roman's car.

He shot her a startled glance, then pulled into traffic. "You had a new memory, huh?"

"Yeah. Brought on by him screwing up and revealing that he knew the CIA were the ones who tortured me, while the NSA agent currently working alongside my team was listening to my therapy session."

Roman's brows drew together. "Shepherd needs to know about this. The bag for your head is in the glove box."

"Great," Jane muttered, pulling the bag out of the compartment and turning it over in her hands. "Can I at least wait until we're out of the city before I put it on?"

"You already know the answer to that."

Jane sighed and put the bag over her head.

As they drove, Roman asked, "Why do you seem so pissed at me?"

"I could have really used Borden's help to heal from the PTSD. Maybe we could have met away from the NYO for some real, honest therapy sessions, where I didn't have to hide who I am and what the CIA did to me."

"It was Shepherd's call to keep it from you. I did suggest we loop you in, but Shepherd didn't want you to know."

"Why not? Was she trying to keep tabs on me? She doesn't trust me, after everything I've suffered through for her?"

Roman sighed. "She wanted to make sure you didn't go too far over to the FBI's side. If you'd started making inferences that you wanted to talk about Aurora, Thornton would tell Shepherd, and we'd pull you out before you did something we'd all regret."

Jane opened her mouth to deliver a sarcastic retort, but then his words registered. "Aurora? That's the name of the lake you took me to, right? The poisoned one?"

She wasn't sure, but she thought she could hear Roman cursing under his breath.

"Yeah. That's the one."

"Why would I talk to Borden—Thornton—about that?" Why is that important to Shepherd?

"You wouldn't. Forget it."

Jane resisted the urge to rip the bag off her head to get a better look at him. He'd just let something slip that Shepherd didn't want her to know. She had to figure out what it was.

A few moments of turning over his words in her head, and she thought she had the answer. "Aurora is the name of our group, isn't it? Why did Shepherd name us after that lake?"

Roman groaned. "I can't talk about this, and you know it."

"That chemical leak happened in the sixties. That would only make Shepherd a kid when it happened, so she couldn't have been involved in the activism at the time. Did she have family out there?"

Roman was silent for a long time. Jane went quiet, too, hoping that if she didn't push his buttons too hard, he'd open up.

After the car came to a stop, he yanked the bag off her head with unexpected violence. "Don't let Shepherd know I screwed up. I covered for you when you wouldn't kill Kantor. Cover for me with this."

Jane nodded. "I won't say anything, I swear. But Roman…was I right about Shepherd losing family because of that spill?"

He hesitated, then nodded. "The government took bribes from the corporation instead of making the assholes fix the what they'd done. Shepherd's whole family got cancer. She did, too. Had to have both her ovaries removed when she was seventeen. She was the only one who beat it. No family left but us, and she couldn't ever have biological kids of her own."

God, that's awful. Even knowing that Shepherd was planning something terrible in retaliation for the corruption that had taken away her whole family, Jane couldn't help but feel sorry for her adopted mother. At least now I know why she's so angry at the world.

"Why did you take me out there, if I wasn't supposed to know?" she asked softly. "Did Shepherd approve it?"

"No. She was pissed when someone told her I did it. But I wanted you to get a sense of what we were fighting against. How are you supposed to stay on our side if you don't know what kinds of atrocities the status quo is feeding?" He shook his head. "Anyway, I got chewed out for it, but I'm glad I took you there. You have to understand."

"I'm glad you did, too. That kind of thing can't keep being allowed to happen." Jane didn't have to fake the hardness to her tone. Her opinion of the Lake Aurora incident hadn't changed since she'd verbally lashed out at Kurt and Nas about it. It was an outrage.

Roman smiled. "There's the Remi we know and love. Come on. Shepherd's gonna want to know what happened with Thornton."

Kurt was almost asleep on the couch, perilously close to losing his place in the latest Winston Pear mystery, when Jane returned to the apartment. He shrugged off his drowsiness in a hurry as she spoke his name, urgency in her tone and the light of discovery in her eyes.

His pulse leapt as he rose from his seat. He'd never seen her looking even halfway optimistic when she'd returned from her meetings with Sandstorm before. Had they finally caught some kind of break?

"Roman slipped up tonight." Jane quickly filled him in on her deduction that Shepherd's organisation went by the name 'Aurora'. "If Shepherd didn't want me to know this, there must be a reason. They could use Aurora as a codename over the phone, in emails, social media—everywhere the NSA monitors. Nas might be able to use that."

Kurt nodded, already reaching for his laptop. "I'll send her an encrypted email now. I don't want to risk calling her after you just got in, just in case. This late at night, it'd look suspicious."

Jane nodded, seeming unwilling to sit down. She paced instead, radiating nervous energy. "Shepherd bought the Borden story. She and Roman are both pissed, and a little rattled. I had to answer a lot of questions about Nas' role and what the scope of her investigation is."

Kurt glanced up, concerned. "You're sure she wasn't trying to trick you, get at the inconsistencies in your story?"

Jane thought about it, then shook her head. "Shepherd hates it when things don't go her way. Her ego gets bruised and she's easier to fool. For now, she believes Borden's under arrest for stealing classified files that told him I was tortured by the CIA—just like we wanted. In a few days, she might start to pull things apart, though."

"We'll look at everything again in the morning, patch up any cracks in the story." He quickly finished his email to Nas, then looked up. "What does she want you to do about Borden?"

"Nothing, for now. She wants me to report on what happens with his interrogation, and she'll decide what to do with him over the next couple of days." Uneasily, Jane stared into space, as though picturing Shepherd in her mind. "I guess it depends what Borden says. If he looks like he's about to flip. I doubt he will, since he knows Shepherd will be watching him through me, but maybe she wants to make sure."

After making sure there weren't any more details Nas would need to know before the following day, Kurt sent the email and pushed aside the laptop. "You okay?"

"About as okay as I always am after meeting with Shepherd." With a shaky sigh, Jane leaned against him. "This is progress, though, right? It feels like we've been spinning our wheels, waiting for something to happen. This thing with Borden might finally be the break we need, if we can play it right."

"Yeah." Kurt wrapped his arms around her, letting go of some of the tension he'd been holding since she'd left to meet Roman. She's home. She's safe. "I hope so."

Jane nodded, nestling deeper into his embrace, as though she was just as relieved that she was home. It made him wonder how she was coping, and how she'd fare now her therapist was in a holding cell.

After a few moments of silence, Kurt spoke again. "How are you feeling? I know you didn't get as much out of your sessions with Borden as you wanted, but…"

"Finding out he was my Sandstorm-sanctioned therapist has shaken me up a little," Jane admitted. "I could have blown my cover without even realising it, and walked straight into a trap."

Kurt tightened his embrace, the thought sending a chill through his blood. Any one of the times she'd met with Roman and Shepherd could have been her last. It was only sheer luck that she'd kept Borden from suspecting she was a double agent.

A subtle shudder went through Jane, and he kissed the top of her head, wishing he could read her mind. "Talk to me," he said softly.

Jane shrugged out of his embrace and stood up. "I just want to forget about this whole thing for a while. I'm gonna go get ready for bed."

Kurt watched her retreat towards the bedroom, conflicted. He could understand her not wanting to dwell on her mission or the day's events more than necessary, but now that she had no therapist, she'd have no outlet for the darkness inside her head. It wasn't as though they could find her another, either. This mission was so strictly classified that only the core team and Pellington knew its true depths. And, as Borden had already proved, Shepherd had her hooks deep into every part of the life she'd known Remi would take up.

It might strain their relationship, but as Jane's partner and her handler, he had to insist.

He found Jane in the bathroom, blankly staring at her reflection in the mirror. "Hey."

She forced a smile and picked up her toothbrush. "Sorry. I'll be out in a minute."

Kurt pressed a kiss to her temple and headed to the bedroom, changing into a T-shirt and sweatpants while he waited for her to emerge. When she did, he pulled back the covers of the bed and beckoned for her to join him.

"There's something I need to talk to you about," he said, once she was tucked up against his side.

Jane instantly tensed up. "Something tells me I'm not gonna like this."

"Maybe not. But it's important, so hear me out."

She nodded, waiting.

"You have to talk to me, Jane. Or, if not me, at least one of the others on the team. With Borden out of play as a therapist, you're gonna need help dealing with all this."

Jane was already shaking her head before he'd gotten halfway through his statement. "I'm fine. I'll deal with it on my own."

"I wish I could let you choose to do that, but this isn't just a personal conversation. It's half to do with work."

She stared at him, her walls already high, and getting higher by the second. "You're pulling rank on me? Kurt—"

"I'm sorry, Jane. I really am. But if you won't talk to me or one of the team, I'll talk to Nas about pulling the plug on this mission."

She recoiled. "You can't do that! I don't get immunity if I don't bring down Sandstorm. Even if the CIA don't swoop back in, my life will never be my own."

"If the alternative is you ending up so stressed and burnt out that you're jeopardising yourself and the mission—"

"Is this about me? Or about getting Shepherd, and taking your pat on the back from Pellington?" she interrupted, hurt and fury radiating from her.

"How can you ask me that?" he said sharply, wounded by her implication. "Jane, every time you leave to meet Roman, I'm scared it will be the last time I see you alive. This isn't about stopping Shepherd. It's about keeping you breathing for long enough to get through this."

Jane took a breath to retort, but he put up his hand, stopping her. "I'm not trying to throw my weight around, here. I know that you're barely keeping your head above water right now, and I can't just watch you struggle until you go under. After we get Shepherd, and you're not at risk of having your cover blown anymore, we can get you another therapist and you never have to talk to me about your PTSD again, if that's what you want. But until then…"

He sighed, giving up. Either she'd see the sense in his request, or she'd shut him out. "I can't force you to tell me anything. But I just want to help, Jane. Please."

Something in his face or his tone must have gotten through to her. The anger draining away from her expression, Jane rubbed her hand over her eyes. "You already deal with the nightmares, the panic attacks… That's more than enough. If I lean on you any more than I already have, I-I'm afraid I'll break us."

"I love you, Jane." He took her hand gently. "And this is only a temporary solution, while we deal with Shepherd. After that, we can look at therapists, sleeping meds, whatever you need. But until then, I just want to keep you from going under, any way I can. Will you let me try?"

Jane swallowed hard. "I don't deserve you, Kurt," she half-whispered.

"No, you deserve better. But you get me, and unless you decide you're done with me, I'm right here." He pulled her into his arms again, his heart wrenching when she gave a muffled sob against his chest. "Tell me what you were thinking earlier, in the living room."

For a long moment, she didn't breathe, didn't move. Then the resistance sapped out of her, and she confessed, "I feel so out of my depth. Like I'm afraid to move in any direction, in case it's the wrong one. Shepherd still won't let me into her inner circle, and I'm so scared I'll say something, or do something, that gives me away. So many lives are depending on me, and things could have gone so wrong with Borden. I can't afford another mistake like this. I can't."

"Roman and Shepherd are just as likely to make mistakes as you are. Roman proved that tonight. So did Borden, earlier today. It's just a matter of time until we get something big, something we can use to end this for good."

"I want to see the light at the end of the tunnel, but every second I spend pretending to be Remi… It feels like it's tainting me. When I dream, half the time I'm the one doing terrible things to other people. I feel like I'm more confused than ever, not about who I was, but about who I am now."

Kurt kissed the top of her head. "If you need me to remind you, just ask. Because I know exactly who you are, Jane. And you're not in any danger of going back to being Shepherd's puppet."

"Maybe not. But this undercover assignment would have been hard without the PTSD. Now it just feels like every day, the pressure gets worse, and there's a voice in my head that's just pleading with me to make it stop…"

As she trailed off into distressed silence, Kurt stroked her hair. I'm sorry, Jane. I'm so sorry. "If I could do this instead of you, I would. I wish like hell that I could take this off your shoulders."

"That would be worse." She sat up, reaching out to trace her hand over his jaw. "None of this means anything if I lose you, Kurt. When I first got out of the black site, all I cared about was finding Shepherd and finding out what her plans were. But now, I just want this to end. To stop it and take a breath, so I can start enjoying my life with you. And when I think about this is all being over, but you being gone, or wanting to move on without me, I…"

Her eyes filled with tears, and she hung her head, her frustration plain. "I'm not explaining this well."

Kurt struggled for words, concern and overwhelming love stealing his voice. Anything he could have said would have sounded hollow and insufficient. After a couple of seconds, he gave up trying to verbalise his feelings and tugged her into an emphatic kiss, the gesture speaking more eloquently than he ever could.

Jane returned the embrace as though she understood and shared his inability to express himself, sliding her fingers into his close-cropped hair and pressing closer, kissing harder. After long, dizzying moments, they broke off, both breathing hard from emotions far more powerful than physical desire.

"This is…not what I expected from a therapy session," she told him, laughing a little, as though the moment was too intense for her to do anything but break the tension.

Kurt finally found the words he'd been searching for. "You can worry about Sandstorm, about your nightmares, about the future… But never worry that I'll walk away from you, Jane. Because I won't."

"Thank you," she whispered. "That makes things…easier."

"I know you have to carry so much of this alone. But whatever you need to pass on to me… I'm strong enough to take it." He glanced at the clock on the nightstand. "It's starting to get late. Think you can fall asleep?"

Jane looked up at him through her lashes, biting her lip. "I actually had a few more things I wanted to say. Just not with my voice."

Kurt leaned in and gave her a soft, brief kiss. "I'm listening."

"You might want to cancel all the rest of your appointments, Dr. Weller. This might take a while." Despite her teasing tone, he sensed the plea beneath her words. Distract me. Love me. Please, Kurt.

There were so many things their situation prevented her from helping her with, but this—this, he could handle.