To the world's credit, they see Abbie precisely the way she wants them to—serious, unaffected, a calm before a storm with a force to reckon with. No one should mess with her, and only the foolish would. Yet, there were those that seemed to get past the façade to truly see her. It unnerved her when she would see that look in those people's eyes, that familiarity that made her nerves raw and left uncertain of how to respond. Corbin was the first, his knowing gaze filled with paternal warmth and sternness. He was quick to call her on her false confidence and impulsive decisions, but always in a way that didn't undermine her intelligence. If she was doing wrong, she was smart enough to figure it out herself. There were moments where Abbie wished he'd just tell her what to do, but Corbin thought she was smarter than that. Frustratingly, she had yet to prove him wrong.

Wendy, the SHPD's key receptionist, had Abbie pegged the instant that they met, pulling the then new recruit into an unsolicited hug while giving a tour of the office. The hug was only halfway returned on Abbie's part, though the woman's infectious giggle was completely shared. No one else saw the moment, but for the briefest of seconds Abbie allowed herself to feel overwhelmed by her new position. "You'll do great," the woman insisted quietly before ushering Abbie back to Corbin's office. The moment did not lead to them being the best of friends, but they had each other's back over the years. Even so, Wendy seemed to be the finest barometer to Abbie's moods; it didn't matter if Abbie gave the receptionist the same greeting with the same inflection at the start of every shift, Wendy would always follow it up with a matronly comment or a question on how Abbie was feeling.

She did not expect Luke to see her; he seemed like another cocky deputy, another jock reminiscent of the ones who plagued her in high school. He was interested enough and she lonely enough, so going out with him worked. Abbie was not blind, she was fully aware that he was not the only man on the force with interest; Andy was enamored with the idea of Abbie Mills yet seemed to be okay with being her friend. Luke Morales, on the other hand, just seemed like the type who would not remain interested for long. It took him longer than the others, but after a few weeks of dating, he began to see her. From then on, it became a battle. He wanted to protect her, convinced to all and sundry that only he could save her from herself and the world. As if all of her capability was lessened by his knowledge of her fear. Hair would rise on her neck every time his voice would drop, just so, as if his typical brashness would cause her to crumple into little pieces. She began to resent his machismo, the more 'serious' he got with their relationship, the more she was reminded why she felt as if she needed to get away from Sleepy Hollow. The growing dread that something was coming for her was only confounded by the sense that Luke was about to do the one thing that would trap her there.

Abbie had one foot out of the door when Ichabod Crane stepped in. She was a natural profiler, a fact that had Quantico keen on enlisting her. There wasn't a person or situation she couldn't suss out within a moment's glance. For some on the force, they had begun to trust her over their own lie detection machines. She never went with her gut feelings on someone; she was bound to get hurt if she ever allowed herself that luxury. But with Ichabod Crane, the man out of time, logic and her instinct aligned in an instant. She knew him. There was a commonality; a shared pain, a heavy loss, a burden that refused to keep them down and a fear that fueled them forward. It was her fear that lead Abbie to continuously doubt him, even in the face of certainty. It was his fear that refused to let her get away from him that easily, that she needed to face the tribulations ahead of them. That she was no longer alone. She didn't want to believe him.

Weeks went by and not a one without some supernatural death at their heels. Crane's presence at her side as a 'consultant' slowly became status quo. He became her unofficial partner, though he would never completely fill August Corbin's shoes. That would've been an impossible feat for any officer. Yet, she began to rely on his judgment, to care for his well-being. Unlike the others who discovered her through her façade, Crane appeared to have never been fooled by it. He saw her for who she was from the moment het locked eyes with her through the bars of his jail cell. There was no change in his eyes, only a penetrating intensity that never seemed to go away. There was no alteration in how he dealt with her, he didn't need to. She couldn't escape his gaze, at times reverent, then other times as if he is peeling back another layer, looking for the parts that she doesn't let anyone ever see. Sometimes, she catches those eyes giving her another look, a flash of something that neither wanted to see or acknowledge, but knew very well what it was. Moments where his eyes were not on her seemed few and far between, but every now and then some mundane appliance, completely foreign to Ichabod's memory would divert him. His eyes would light up with an almost childlike curiosity, followed with a bemused expression as he tried to figure out the device's purpose.

He would only deign to ask her questions out of expediency or once his expansive knowledge ran out of logical explanations. She knew now it was not merely out of pride, but as to not run out of goodwill for questions of a more 'personal nature'. If he wasted his cache on whimsy, she'd have the ammunition to ignore the things he truly wished to know. Regardless, his questions managed to cut down to the bone, yet she found herself answering instead of telling the man to bother someone else. It didn't matter how much she said, or how little, he still could piece together the full picture. How, after leaving him behind to face her estranged sister all of these years, he knew.

She found herself stuck in the driver's seat of her Durango, fears and misplaced guilt swirling in her mind. The Sandman only got her to face her fear and acknowledge her sins, but was she truly ready to see the hatred in Jenny's eyes? Her chest hurt at the memory of their last meeting, she could only imagine that it had only intensified over the years. Just when she was about to back down, the passenger door opened and Ichabod hopped into the seat, clicking his seat belt with aplomb. "You're my transport back to my lodging," was his only explanation, though his expression belied that fact. Abbie decided as she pulled out of the parking lot that she would have to lock him in when they got to the asylum, lest he decided he needed to follow her inside under some lame excuse as well. She could barely stand how much she appreciated his support.