A/N Notes at end.

EIGHT

Helen walked into the lab and was hit by the stench of death. The cardboard box lay forlornly on Henry's desk, and she only needed to take one step forward to know it was the source. So, Algernon was finally dead.

"I hope you had good dreams," She whispered to the mouse. She took one last vial of the Shepherd's venom and placed it into her pocket. She would suffer no more of the dreams, seductive and violent at the same time, but what was contained in this vial was enough for three sips.

She wasn't sure why, but it was important to her that she have it. She left the lab, turning off the lights, and made her way to the grounds outside.

Under the old birch tree she saw a small stone plaque set into the ground. There was some freshly overturned earth below it. She knelt underneath the tree and read the inscription. "Nikola Tesla: Genius." Despite her sorrow she laughed.

She lay down on the ground, her fingers skimming over the smooth stone, and she fell asleep. She dreamt of nothing.

When Helen woke, the sky was a dark blanket of stars. Had she slept that long? The night chill had crept into her arms, and she rubbed them for warmth.

"Why have they not given you a year of death, dear friend?" She said to the headstone. It remained silent and unyielding, the bold letters of his name barely visible in the darkness.

Helen, struck by some unknown impulse, began to scoop away the earth with her hands. It fell from her fingers, clumped and moist, and she didn't realize she was building up momentum until a drop of sweat fell into her eye. There was a large pile of dirt beside her, and she looked down at the sizeable hole she had made.

Like a woman possessed, she scraped away the dirt around the edges of the headstone and freed it from its nesting place. She used that to hack away at the earth and shovel more away.

Helen did not know for how long she dug, her arms mechanically moving of her own accord, soon scraping away at the walls of earth she had formed, until the edge of the headstone suddenly scraped against something hard. Breathless, Helen kicked her heel against the ground and felt wood.

She looked up and saw the walls of the earthen chamber reaching just above her head, the night sky winking back at her. She should climb back up, leave this resting place…

Helen looked back down at her feet, and then fell to her knees and scraped away more dirt until she revealed the wooden surface of a coffin.

Her hands scraped raw and bleeding, she struck the wooden surface with the headstone until it splintered and cracked. Desperately, she pulled apart the flimsy boards, tossing them carelessly to the side.

Nikola lay there, still, his eyes closed, and she brushed away some of the loose dirt from his face. She yanked up more boards until there was a hole large enough for her to lie down beside him. She wrapped an arm around his cold body and rested her head against his shoulder.

"Vilmot te…" She whispered.

An arm squeezed her back, and shaking she buried her face deeper into him. She felt fingers brushing the hair from his face, and a rumble through the chest she was resting on when he spoke.

"No, Helen, don't sleep here."

"Nikola, I feel lost…"

He moved against her, shifting so he could see her face. He cupped her face in his hand, his thumb stroking lightly up and down her jaw. "Try, Helen, try…"

Helen reached down and felt inside her pocket. She drew up the small vial of Shepherd's venom, and graced him with a trembling smile. "One sip for waking, two to help sleep, and three for soul's dreaming…"

Nikola shook his head, his face lined with concern and longing. He wrapped his hand around hers. "Why, lubjav, why this?"

"It's only when I'm dreaming that I feel truly alive."

Nikola took the vial from her, gently slipping it out of her fingers. His skin felt cool and dry. "Don't give in to your dreams, Helen."

He leant forward and kissed her gently, a feather's touch against her lips. She could smell a hint of wine amongst the warmth, and damp of the earthen grave around them. She shuddered against him. "I don't want to say goodbye."

He chuckled softly, she could feel his laughter and reveled in the life behind it. "I would never leave so easily. I'm here … seculo seculorum, semper et in aeternum, inter somnium…"

Helen closed her eyes, drinking in the gentle promise, and repeated it aloud to herself. "Forever and ever…forever and always…in dreams…"

Nikola held her face gently in his hands and said, "I think she's awake."

"What?"

"Awake, I think she's awake…"

"Hurry, get in here."

"Magnus? Are you there?"

Helen felt a flurry of movement around her, and a sudden disturbance of weight to her right. Her eyes were suddenly hit with a flash of brilliant light, and she moaned and shut them against the unexpected assault.

"Oh my god, doc…"

"Don't just stand there gawking, make yourself useful."

She felt disoriented, pain suddenly flooding through her body. Everything hurt, but most of all she felt like something was tearing inside her head. The shock of the pain, like white-hot bolts of lighting, knocked her out breathless and she felt a swoop of nausea.

"Helen…" She felt two warm hands encircle around her own, and was grateful for the touch, using it to help orient herself. "Helen…"

She cracked her eyes open, fighting down the spell of dizziness, and squinting against the brilliant light. Her vision swam, and she held onto the warm presence beside her. Struggling, she saw a familiar face come into focus, taut and worn with concern.

"Nikola?" Her voice could barely raise above a whisper. She saw a pained and hopeful reaction on his face at the sound of her voice. "Nikola…oh gods…"

She fainted dead away again.

Helen rested on the verge of consciousness for the next few hours, her body protesting at being awake, and too weak to exert herself at all. She was always looked over by someone sitting at her bedside, and had various drips and shots administered to her.

"I know it hurts…" She heard Will's voice as if it were underwater. "But we've got to do this gradually or your entire system might go into shock. Hang in there, you've done great. The worst is over…"

When she was finally well enough to stay awake and alert, she noticed an empty wine bottle on the table beside her bed, and a worn book by Borges. She looked about her, but despite all the signs of his occupation, there was no Nikola.

She sank back, dreading to be in another dream, but this time she felt distinctly awake. The pain in her limbs and in her head was hard-edged and unrelenting.

Will sat down beside her, the Big Guy behind him, and the look of relief on his tired, hollow face made her crack a weak smile. "It's good to see you again."

"Nikola?"

Will nodded amiably. "We forced him to go sleep. He's been here every day looking after you."

Helen felt an unpleasant stickiness in her mouth, gratefully drinking from the cup of water the Big Guy pressed into her hand. "What happened?"

"We got a distress call on the auto-type and flew over as soon as we could. You guys were buried under a lot of rubble. We later found out that there's a very old, very nasty abnormal living down in those caverns along with the Shepherd frogs. An earth elemental."

Helen began to nod, then had to stop herself as the pain in her head crippled her from any sudden movement. The rest of the puzzle was beginning to fall into place now, though.

Will continued. "When we found you … your heart had stopped beating. One of the rocks fell on your head. Tesla injected you with the venom and your systems came back online, but it's been touch and go since … you've—"

Helen smiled weakly and said, "I've been having some very odd dreams…"

The Big Guy grunted and jabbed a thumb into his chest. "Same thing I went through. Some people make it out, some don't."

"Tesla's been here these whole three weeks trying to wake you up." Will looked down, a little shame-faced. "After the first week, some of us lost hope, but he insisted you would snap out of it. He wouldn't let us touch you."

Helen felt a small chill at the reflection of what she had been going through in her mind, and felt a small prickle on her palm. She looked down and saw two faint cuts forming a "T". Her breath stopped, suddenly afraid she was in a dream again.

Will noticed how it disturbed her, and quickly offered, "He did that to try and wake you up. He did a lot of loony things."

The Big Guy let out a small bark of laughter. "He walked in one day and yelled, 'heal yourself!' He hadn't slept in three days."

"He spoke to me the entire time," Helen said quietly, almost to herself. Will and the Big Guy nodded, and she felt her eyes slipping shut.

"Get some rest. It's all over now." Will squeezed her hand comfortingly, and took her cup of water from her. Helen felt a small note of fear to fall back asleep, but Will's continued reassurance finally convinced her it was safe to dream again.

When Helen woke next, it was to find Nikola slumped over in his chair beside her, his head resting against the wall. His hand was resting lightly on her bedside, curled against her own.

When she stirred awake, he sprang up like a cat, his eyes wide until he realized what had woken him. Relief washed over his face, and then his eyes narrowed into a glare.

"Don't scare me like that again."

He stretched out his arms, working out a kink in his shoulder blades, rubbing his face tiredly. He looked more gaunt than usual, his eyes hollow. He looked a touch self-conscious when she continued to stare at him, a secret smile on her lips, and frowned.

"I know I don't look my best, but I'm not used to taking care of patients, you know."

Helen laughed lightly. "Perish the thought. Your bedside manner would scare them all away."

He placed a gentle hand under her chin, tilting her head to the right and the left as he examined her. "How are you feeling?"

"Oh, like hell." He smiled at that.

"Sweet dreams? You've been giving sleeping beauty a run for her money."

Helen smiled at him. Despite his bluster and barbed banter, his worry, his fears and his devotion were so transparent to her now. She said mysteriously, "Yes. I dreamed of Smiljan."

That caught him off guard, and she saw a twinge of nervousness on his face. While she had been sleeping he had nakedly poured all of his grief and his feeling onto her sleeping form; ranting, pleading, cajoling, and endlessly asking for her to wake up. He didn't know what to do now that she was awake and had heard him.

"Was it nice?"

She made to sit up, and he eased an arm around her to help. "It was lonely. It was cold."

He snorted. "And you wonder why I've never been back."

"It wouldn't be so lonely if we went together. Old friends." Helen felt her weakened body tremble, and her hand curled into his shirt as she waited for the tremor to subside. He tucked his arm more securely around her in concern, his face tilted ever so closely to hers. She could feel his breath against her cheek.

"Nikola, I still feel so tired … I don't want to fall asleep again."

He murmured soothingly beside her ear, "I'll be here…" She rested, comforted, against him, her eyes already feeling heavy, and felt a smile creep onto her lips for she could swear she heard the faint whisper of "lubjav" trailing from the end of his sentence.

END

A/N Thanks for everyone who's joined me on this wild ride. I hope you all enjoyed it as much as I had fun writing it. If anything is left unclear, I will try to answer them in review responses.

Also, in terms of the Latin present in the fic, I have done my best with limited resources, but the phrases may not translate cleanly into English, so please take with a grain of salt.