A/N: First and foremost, my reviewers take my breath away. You all are the reason I write, and to hear such kind words totally and completely makes me giddy. Thank you :D I want to offer my apologies for not updating this sooner. I was working on my "Positions" series (which sounds really porny until you actually read it) and I just couldn't get back to that angsty place I needed to be in order to write this. But it's baaaa-ack. Hope you like.

Daniel found Justin asleep on his mother's faux fur-lined leopard print jacket. At least, he thought he was asleep at first.

Upon closer inspection, the boy's liquid eyes were opened into slits, as usual watching his every move and filing it all away to be emulated later. His little pale blue Ralph Lauren vest was wrinkled, and Daniel knew it to be the only instance of their acquaintance that Justin was not immaculately groomed.

Daniel could practically feel the frail, gentle child genuflect with relief when he sat down next to him. He'd never understand why Justin worshipped him so; the only thing he could figure was the time he'd intervened during Santos's bullying. He and Justin were alike in that regard, if nothing else: they could both never be the sons that their now-deceased fathers had wanted.

Daniel now numbly stared at his untouched coffee.

It occurred to him, while looking into the nauseatingly fragrant depths of his cup, that maybe he should say something comforting, but anything coherent he could think of would just be spitting out an ultimately pointless platitude.

God, he was slow tonight.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw that Justin was openly observing him now, his tousled head propped up on two delicately folded hands.

Daniel haltingly began, "Um, your Aunt Betty, she's going to be…"

"I know." Justin inclined his head towards Daniel's coffee. "Drink."

The obstinate expression—the raised eyebrows, the slightly pursed lips, the dark, well-meaning eyes daring him to disobey—were so much like his aunt's when he'd had too many drinks or refused to take his cold medicine or while coaxing him to eat a bagel, that Daniel almost snorted with wry amusement.

He shouldn't have been surprised. He saw Betty in absolutely everyone and everything nowadays, from Justin to a butterfly on the window of his office.

Daniel downed the coffee, welcoming its searing heat. When he turned back to Justin, he was looking through the glass partition at Betty.

"I wonder if she's dreaming."

It wasn't really a question. "Betty's always dreaming," Daniel responded truthfully.

"I guess so." The words were a whisper; eyes never leaving Betty, who was looking smaller and frailer by the minute somehow, he said, "I'm going back to sleep now. Wake me up if…anything happens."

"You bet."

And because he could sit still no longer, Daniel stood and returned to Betty's side.

DBDBDBDBDBDBDBDBDBDBDBDBDBDBDBDBDBDBDBDBDBDBDBDBDBD

Daniel sat beside Betty and forced himself to really look at her for the first time since they'd both landed in the sterile, utterly lifeless, utterly un-Betty-like hellhole.

"Hey, baby, I'm right here," he whispered, afraid to touch the Betty mannequin propped up before him.

But Betty was always one for looking at problems head-on, blinking her soft brown eyes at it, then charming the hell out of it; Daniel figured he at least owed her the same effort.

Even if it was killing him. "Oh, my God, what have they done to you…"

Anguished blue eyes traveled over soft, pale bloodless cheeks; the sprinkle of freckles starkly stood out, almost taunting him because they emphasized the colorlessness of her once-vibrant face. Her once-full, gorgeous, bitable, kissable mouth was now painfully chapped and drawn into a scarily indifferent line.

She would've hated the incessant beeping of the monitor; she always hit him repeatedly with a pillow until he turned off the alarm in the mornings.

Daniel had to look away; the glass partition was a safe bet…focus on Justin, pretending to sleep…but he did not, could not see Justin. Instead he saw Betty smacking right into the very similar, equally and formerly clean glass partition of the Mode conference room like a little multicolored sparrow, one that dazzled the eyes and, eventually, the heart, ever the tiny whirlwind of lively hues and creativity:

Are you okay?

Hi, I'm Betty Suarez! I'm your new assistant. I'm really looking forward to working with you…

Daniel swallowed against the odd tightening of his throat. He pressed light, urgent kisses on her translucent eyelids, her hair, her mouth, the tip of her nose.

"So, they say you can hear me," he began lamely. "And that's good because I have some things I need to say to you, Betty."

He took a deep breath. "First of all, you can't leave me. I'm pulling rank here and as your boss, I forbid it. I've been pretty lax in everything so far because, well, I love giving you everything you want, but if you want to leave me, that's just too damn bad."

The more Daniel focused on Betty's blank, sleeping face, the more desperate were the words that tumbled out of his mouth. It's not that he expected her to wake up and roll her eyes, but that's very much what he wanted.

"I couldn't tell my father I loved him before he died. Never told you that, did I? Didn't want you to think I was cold. But when you wake up, I'll tell you I love you when we wake up and when we go to bed, when we make love, when we're standing on our bridge, when we're riding up and down the elevator…all the time, always. You're the best thing that ever happened to me, you know that? The best thing, the only thing my father ever did for me was sending me you."

Daniel felt his chest compressing with fear; everything is always more frightening when the world stops spinning and comes into crystal clear focus. He wished desperately he could go back into his shell of dull feeling. Betty, Betty, my Betty... He lightly, tremblingly fingered the heavy bandage on her chest. Her exit wound was bullet-shaped. His was Betty-shaped, and it was ripping through him with a greater, more tragic force than any hunk of metal ever could.

He grasped for the rage that had sustained him for a time during this miserable night but it would not return. "God, you completely butt into my life, and you piss me off and you're so damn stubborn, Betty…"

Something broke, just utterly snapped within him. Daniel did something he could not do while standing in an Armani suit and bearing his beloved Alex's casket, something he could not do when his mother went insane, when his father went to his grave taking the last chance of Daniel's redemption in his eyes, when Sophia's betrayal left him more jaded and wary than before: Daniel wept.

His lifeline was dissolving, his Betty was in a place he couldn't follow, and he wept.

The ridiculous notion came into his head that Betty would be so proud of him for his newfound ability.

He instinctively, nonsensically looked up at her through a salty haze to find her blinking placidly at him. Her eyebrows were furrowed with concern, but a small half-smile quirked the corner of her healing mouth. Her hand with its tube and gauze and tape was held out palm-up.

In the center, one of his tears had fallen.

She seemed proud.

Whew. Make it through that one alive? The next chapter is a little more lighthearted, kind of an epilogue, really. Please review, I beg of you, 'cause it is surely craved ;)