A/N: Hey everybody! I really wanted to update this sooner, but Real Life has become annoyingly busy again. This is also longer than the previous chapter, so hopefully it was worth the wait! And let's celebrate the fact that in 2 weeks, SEASON 4 STARTS!
I had a lot of fun writing this one, so I hope you'll enjoy it too :) Thank you all for reading!
CHAPTER TWO - DEJA-VU
...
Olivia
...
What started as a bad mood had now sunk to an abysmal level.
"Olivia, I really think you should stop the car."
She barely registered the worry in Sam's voice, too busy pushing a few buttons on her steering wheel with traitorously trembling fingers. "I'm not stopping that car until we reach Boston," she told him harshly, before ordering to her car: "Call Nina Sharp."
As the line rang, she tried her best to compose herself, a hand back to her face, something she had been attempting to do for the last few minutes, ever since Broyles' first words. Now that the initial shock was starting to fade, another kind of emotion was taking over, one that was anything but peaceful.
Nina picked up quickly enough, greeting her with her usual nonchalance. "Agent Dunham. I was expecting your call."
Olivia clenched her teeth, dropping her hand to hold on tightly to the steering wheel, her knuckles turning white. "Did it ever occur to you that it would have been wiser for you to call me when -I don't know, my alternate contacted you last night, maybe?"
"Of course," Nina replied calmly. "It was my intention as soon as I learned she was here. However, after talking with her, it became obvious that the wisest option would actually be to wait."
Her irritation managed to worsen significantly. "To wait for what?" She almost shouted. "A known, dangerous enemy comes back to our side, just when our world begins to fall apart, and you don't see it fit to let us know right away?"
"Olivia," Nina said more gravely. "I've heard it all from Philip already, as I'm sure he told you. She was hurt and suffering from the aftereffects of her crossover, and she has been mostly unconscious ever since we retrieved her from Liberty Island. She was hardly able to tell us anything at all. I didn't think it was necessary to…distract you immediately from your rather important task."
Olivia somehow highly doubted this was entirely true, and the thought of Nina willingly keeping her in the dark to try and spare her the emotional turmoil was almost as embarrassing as it was infuriating.
She remembered clearly the conversation she had with the older woman a few months ago, at a time when she was feeling particularly down and insecure, and she had opened up too much about her feelings regarding her Alternate and Peter. Needless to say she was bitterly regretting this moment of vulnerability right now.
"I'm sure Philip also told you that she's on her way to Walter's lab as we speak," Nina added.
Oh yes, Olivia knew that all too well. "Yes, I'm aware of that. I'm heading there myself."
According to Broyles, Massive Dynamic had finally contacted him and Walter when they were unable to 'fix' her. Apparently, Walter already had a few ideas that required her, Olivia, to come to the lab as well, and she did not like the sound of this at all.
She had to go, though.
But she also had to drop Sam off to the museum first –the world hadn't stopped crumbling in the middle of all of this, which meant she wouldn't get there for at least another twenty minutes; no matter what, she was well decided on making it there before the helicopter transporting her Alternate.
Not that it meant anything, of course.
"From what she did tell us, she's not here to harm us," Nina carefully said, almost solemnly.
But Olivia had heard it all from Broyles indeed , and wouldn't believe it until she was shown a proof that the Other Olivia hadn't come back to screw up her world.
In every possible way.
"You'll understand if I remain cautious on that matter," she replied, bleakly. "I think we all know by now just how good an actress she can be."
"Of course," Nina said, unaffected by Olivia's bitter words. "But as I said, she's hardly a threat at the moment. If Walter can't find an effective cure, she won't live long enough to see the outcome of this war."
It was Olivia's turn to be unperturbed by this statement. She was not going to feel sorry for her, not when she was obviously here by choice again. The fact that she had either chosen to obey Walternate's orders or had come here of her own accord hardly mattered.
She was here. And in Olivia's book, it would never be a good thing.
"What did she tell you, exactly?" She asked, trying not to get sucked back into this dark pit of insecurities she thought she had managed to fill up a few months ago. There obviously had been cracks in her cement, because it was all coming back way too fast.
"Not much, quite honestly. She has really been unconscious for the most part."
"Humor me, Nina," Olivia insisted. "I'm sure you can manage a simple paraphrasing."
"I'm…afraid you're not going to like it."
Olivia could feel the acid burning in her empty stomach as she became even more sullen. Nina had just confirmed what she had been suspecting all along: they all thought she wouldn't be able to handle it.
"Try me," she told her sternly, in her best 'don't-push-me' voice.
Nina's sigh resonated in the car, before she spoke again: "She said that her only purpose here was to speak to Peter. She was…rather adamant on that point. She said she would not speak to anyone else."
As it turned out, Nina was right.
Olivia did not like it at all.
…
"Call this number once you've got the Key," Olivia told Sam, handing him the piece of paper on which she had just scribbled a phone number. "And only once you've got it. I don't care if you only find a clue here and need to search the entire city next. I personally think you could have spared us a lot of time if you had gone on that hunt on your own a long time ago, and don't even think about having second thoughts again, I still have my gun, and I'm not exactly in a good mood."
Sam pocketed the paper with a slight scowl. "Don't say that, you are a true ray of sunshine. I'm going to miss your company." She rewarded him with a glare of her own. "I'll get the Key," he promised, defeated. "In any case, considering the new developments, we're going to need to have a serious talk."
And on these words, he opened his door and stepped out of the car.
"Hey, what does that mean?" she called him out, somewhat dumbfounded that he dared play riddles with her now.
He gave her a look that was graver than usual. "I'll tell you if I don't die in that museum. I don't know if you've noticed, but it looks pretty animated from here." He was referencing to the jolts of lightning that surrounded the entire building. "Don't sweat it too much for now, Dunham. I'll tell you all I know soon enough."
And on that, he closed the door, marching away rapidly. She was tempted to get out herself and demand an explanation –she was in the kind of mood that made her draw a gun on him. But her eyes fell on the clock instead, and her desire to make it to the lab first came back.
Unsurprisingly, she did not make it first.
She was intercepted by Astrid as soon as she passed the doors, as if the young woman had been standing guard, waiting for her. Which surely was what she had been doing.
Their eyes met, and the look on Astrid's face was all the confirmation Olivia needed.
"She's here?" she found herself asking anyway, and Astrid nodded.
"She arrived about fifteen minutes ago," she said in a soft voice that Olivia recognized as the one she usually used with Walter, when she was afraid whatever she had to say would upset him. But Olivia's focus had already shifted, taking a few small, careful steps, stopping at the edge of the stairs to look down at the room below.
Sure enough, there she was, lying on that long chair she had found herself sitting in more than once, Walter busying himself around her, masking her face from Olivia's view. Her heart thumping hard somewhere at the base of her throat, she turned back to Astrid, highly disliking the empathetic look on her face.
"Why didn't you call me?" She asked then, her voice barely above a whisper. "Why didn't you call me when Nina and Broyles contacted Walter earlier this morning?"
Astrid shook her head. "I'm sorry," she said, and she looked as remorseful as she sounded. "I…We were actually outside when Broyles called me, doing an experiment to try and find the last data needed to understand the pattern of the events happening all around, and Walter had just gotten hit by thunder –twice, and he was just…You know how he gets when he's excited, and he was really excited after talking to Nina. I just thought…I thought we could handle this on our own for a while, and not make you stop what you were doing right away."
Olivia's discomfort and aggravation grew, recognizing the same tentative caution in Astrid's voice that there had been in Nina's. For once, she wished people would be honest with her and admit what they really thought –that they all feared she would react badly.
Less than an hour had passed since she was told Alternate had crossed over, and she was already tired of people walking on eggshells around her because of it. She was not made of glass.
She was about to say something of the sort to Astrid when Walter's voice boomed, down below.
"Olivia!" He exclaimed, and she had no other choice but to turn around and look at him; Astrid was right, he was almost beaming. "Come on down, come on down!"
Her mood as sinister as Walter's was cheery, she walked down the steps, her eyes now on the unconscious woman, unable to look away. She knew that staring at her own face would never cease to be both eerie and highly disturbing, but what she felt in regard of her Alternate had changed quite significantly since they had last been close enough for her to stare at her that way. The first time around, there had been awe and a bit of fear, as well as an intense feeling of desperation. Now, what she felt was mostly resentment.
A lot of resentment.
She was realizing how much easier it had been to reflect on this Other Olivia, to try and understand her and the things she had done to her, when she had been reading her file, or lying wide awake at night with her cheek pressed upon Peter's chest. The feel of his hand low on her back and of his breath in her hair had been real and comforting, the strong and regular beat of his heart whispering in her ear that it was all in the past.
Looking at her now, staring at her pale features, she found it atrociously hard to remember why she even tried to understand her motives in the first place.
Olivia might not be made of glass, she was still very much human.
"So…" She eventually said, still unable to move her gaze away from that face that looked so much like her own. "What's wrong with her, exactly?"
Whatever it was, it wasn't that obvious. Sure, she looked pale and there was a waxy, sickly tone to her skin…not to mention the dried blood in her hair and on her clothes. Olivia knew about the gunshot wound; that was the only thing Massive Dynamic had been able to heal easily, apparently.
"It's simple, really," Walter told her, and behind them, she could hear Astrid coming down the steps. "Her body is suffering from her crossing over. As you very well know, anyone who does not possess your natural abilities subjects their metabolism to extreme stress by doing so, and without immediate and proper treatment, the consequences can be severe. Massive Dynamic's scientists have estimated that she was on our side for at least four hours before they started treating her, and what they have tried has had very little effect so far. Except for one thing, and this is why you're here."
And with that, he was on the move again, a spring in his step, gathering materials. Olivia was still confused, and more than a little annoyed by how obviously delighted he felt about all this, when the world was still dying outside.
"Why am I here, Walter?" She asked firmly, but he ignored her.
"Astro, help me get Olivia ready, would you?" He said instead, now dragging a similar chair near the one on which her Alternate lay, and Olivia did not like the sight of this at all.
"First of all, ask Olivia if she's willing to do it before you start anything," Astrid answered from one of the tables, and Olivia turned to look at her, noticing that she was now bent over a pile of maps and data. "Second of all, someone still needs to work on those data we collected earlier so we can stop the universe from crumbling too fast, remember? So I'll do that while you explain everything to Olivia."
When Olivia turned back to Walter, he had stopped moving, his arms full of syringes and other medical instruments she instantly highly disapproved of. His smile had faltered a little, and there was a look of incredulity on his face as he stared at Astrid, as if it hadn't even occurred to him that he should explain everything to Olivia before starting whatever he was planning on doing. By the time he moved his eyes back to Olivia, his smile was completely gone.
The way she was glaring at him might have something to do with it.
"Actually, most of the credit goes to Mr. Fayette," he said. "Her wound caused her to lose an important amount of blood, which required a transfusion, obviously. When her body kept on failing alarmingly fast despite their treatments, Mr. Fayette decided to try something else."
"Brandon was the one who thought about using your blood, Olivia," Astrid summarized behind them, knowing that it could take Walter ten minutes to get to his point. "They apparently had some of it stored in New York."
"Not enough of it, though," Walter continued. "Since you have the exact same blood cells, his initial goal was simply to make her body recover more efficiently from the blood loss, but as it appeared, a small amount of your sampled blood was enough to slow the degradation for a little while. That is why I believe a direct blood transfusion between the two of you should eventually stop the process altogether."
Olivia's mind was swirling, not sure she was understanding this at all, and not liking what she did understand. "Wait a minute," she stopped him, raising her hands. "Are you suggesting that I have to give her some of my blood?"
"More than 'some', if my calculations are correct," he nodded his head. "I will also have to give you some drugs first, to make the transfer more effective, and lessen the effects on your side. A small dose of cortexiphan might be needed as well, since it is what makes your body naturally immune to the stress of-"
"Stop right there," Olivia interrupted him sternly, a hand still raised, her face grave. "Why should I put myself through all of this, exactly? What proof do we have that she isn't here under Walternate's orders?"
Walter answered at once, so austerely that he actually looked like his counterpart for a moment: "None, truth be told. She very well could be."
Goose-bumps erupted all over Olivia's skin.
She was never prepared for those moments, when she saw the Secretary through Walter. Whenever it happened, it always gave her the urge to take more than a few steps back, having learned the hard way to instinctively fear pain and death around him.
She didn't yield to this urge, though, crossing her arms in front of her chest instead, her body tingling with the adrenaline that had just flooded her precious blood.
"How can you ask me this, then?" She asked, truly at a loss, confused on so many levels. "How can you ask me to just…forget what she's done, and do this for her?"
He still looked like the Secretary when he said: "Because you wouldn't be able to live with yourself if it turned out she was truly here to help, and that you let her die, and possibly let our world die, without even trying."
His words felt like a slap, causing her to physically recoil slightly. "That's unfair, Walter," she told him quietly, but her voice still rang with reproaches, feeling both hurt and livid.
"There is no fairness in war," he replied then. Just like that, his cold mask crumbled, his wrinkly face now a mask of sheer sadness and regrets, his eyes apologetic and lost. "You and I both know that sacrifices need to be made in times like these. Harsh decisions need to be taken."
She knew he could have been talking about so many things, from the drug trials in Jacksonville to the time when they crossed over last year to rescue Peter, causing the death of more than one innocent.
But she knew he only had Peter on his mind at that instant, Peter lying bruised and comatose in a hospital bed. She knew it, because her own mind and heart were filled with the same image.
She shook her head curtly, a tensed, pained smile pulling at the corners of her mouth. "You know Peter would not approve of me doing this if he was here. He wouldn't even approve of you suggesting it."
"If I'm not mistaken, Peter did not ask for your approval before he attempted to step into the Machine," Walter replied straight away, even more sternly than before. "Why should his opinion matter in this case?"
"Walter," Astrid reprimanded him, knowing just how low this blow was, but Olivia raised a hand again, keeping her eyes on Walter.
"It's alright," she said, her voice oddly calm, although she felt like she had just received a punch in the stomach. "It's the truth, after all."
And wasn't it what Olivia had been waiting to hear? Honest words from the people who cared about her?
She was well acquainted with the fact that the truth hurt, in most cases, especially in the matter of the heart. But she also believed that the hurtful truth was better than any lie.
She couldn't ignore how Peter had indeed chosen not to tell her about his intention, but she didn't see this as a lie.
He hadn't told her because he did want her to be there. They didn't know what would happen to him. As far as they knew, direct contact between him and the Machine would cause his eyes to erupt in rays of fire. She easily understood why he had wanted to spare her that sight.
On some level, she also knew she had unconsciously chosen not to know as well. It was so obvious to her now, how he would have tried anything to stop the world from dying because of a Machine directly linked to him. She had read it in his eyes yesterday, during that last moment, here in the lab. She had seen his desire to tell her these words neither of them had spoken out loud yet, words that always seemed to become vital during goodbyes.
But none of them wanted for this moment to be their goodbyes, and so they had remained quiet, hoping the other could read it all in their eyes.
Part of her wished she could tell this to Walter, defend herself, defend Peter, explain how his silence regarding his decision wasn't a sign of dishonesty, but a sign that he cared too much to have her there. And yet, she didn't want Walter to understand their dynamic; she didn't need for the rest of the world to know their secrets.
In any case, she didn't have to tell Walter anything at all, as someone else spoke for her, then.
"So, is Peter still alive, or did I come all this way for nothing?"
...
Liv
...
Admittedly, it might not have been the best way for her to start this exchange, especially knowing this conversation could very well determine whether or not she would survive this trip.
But what could she say? She just loved a good opening line.
Plus, she was still all sort of dizzy. And nauseous. Not to mention the pain.
Liv had been awake for a few minutes when she decided to speak. She had listened to them argue over her fate, and then they had mentioned Peter. From the way they talked about him, their voices full of insinuations, along with the overstretched silences, something had clearly happened to him.
Hence her question. Which was a valid one, really.
When her Alternate finally turned her gaze back to her after hearing her speak, she was pretty sure she would have died on the spot if a glare could kill.
She recognized every sign of deep annoyance and intense dislike on her face, her eyes narrowing.
"You've really got some nerve," she told her, then, and Liv couldn't help it. She felt the corner of her mouth twitch, curving in a cocky smile.
"So I've been told," she said weakly with a dry chuckle, trying to ignore the throbbing pain in her chest, and in every inch of her body. She could hardly move at all. "I'm pretty sure you've heard it a few times yourself."
Wrong answer, again.
If she hadn't been so out of it, she might have gotten seriously worried for her safety then, because she saw the gun on Olivia's hip, and knew that such a look in her own case usually preceded the use of said gun.
"Don't you even go there," Olivia told her austerely, shaking her head slowly, something close to a sneer now distorting her face.
It was…interesting, actually, to see –and feel, such a display of loathing coming from the other woman. If she had shown that kind of emotion last year when they first met, instead of the weepy desperation she had shown -even when she had been the one with the gun, things might have been different.
Or maybe not.
What happened, happened, and judging by the intensity of her resentment, her Alternate knew exactly what had happened. She looked like a lioness whose territory had been shamelessly trespassed.
It was actually a very fitting simile.
"So he told you everything, uh?" She couldn't help but say, her voice still barely louder than a whisper, though she realized just how unwise it was. "That must have taken some guts. I didn't think he would do it."
She had to admire her self-control; she watched as Olivia pressed her lips hard together, beyond livid now, and suddenly, it was as if a bomb that had been about to explode simply stopped ticking. The lethal energy was still there, but she had chosen to contain it rather than let it overpower her.
She offered her a scornful smile then, shrugging a shoulder in fake indifference. "What can I say? He chose honesty over comfortable and ugly lies. Something tells me Frank got the latter treatment on your side."
This actually did sting a bit, and the small smile she had on her lips wavered for a second. But she couldn't offer to display weakness, not now, not when she was already physically weakened.
She quickly brought the smile back on her face, made it even cockier, more daring, and it was her turn to shrug, one of the few movements she could still manage. "Well, you know, confidential mission and all. Not much I could say."
This caused her Alternate to chuckle humorlessly, anything but amused at the moment, and she shook her head slowly with a look of pure hatred on her face. "Why are you even here?" She asked then. "Why bother showing your face, when you know we could have you locked up and rotting in a cell right now?"
Liv was very tempted to be daring just a little longer, and ask her why she hadn't locked her up yet, but she knew it would be stupid...and the answer was obvious anyway. She was hardly a threat at the moment. She probably couldn't have sneezed without feeling like blades were piercing her skin, judging by how painful breathing had become.
She decided to give herself a slim chance, then, and lost the smile. "I came here to speak to Peter," she answered honestly.
She didn't miss the irony, remembering how she had told her almost the exact same words the first time they met.
Olivia's sinister smile became even more ominous, letting her know she hadn't missed the irony either. "Then I guess you really came here for nothing. He's not able to speak to anyone right now, though I speak for him when I say that if he could, he'd probably tell you to go to hell."
Liv really didn't like how she couldn't help but feel a nudging worry at her words, and that it wasn't even directed towards her own fate. She had fought hard and long for weeks and weeks to try and push Peter back to a corner of her mind, to try and ignore the fact that she had let herself be weak during her Mission by letting herself care.
She had to admit that not thinking about him at all had become particularly hard ever since she gave birth to his son.
But Henry had nothing to do with this. This was not why she had come here, and she was well decided on not mentioning her baby at all if she could avoid it.
For the time being, though, he was on her mind again, and it was extremely hard to push his face out of her thoughts when it was starting to dawn on her that she might never get to see him again. That she might never get to hold him again, to breathe in the scent of his skin and get intoxicated on his baby smell.
Fuck this. She wasn't going to let herself die.
But the choice wasn't exactly hers, was it? She had heard Walter's words.
"So, you're just going to let me die?" She asked her Alternate, and there was no more smile on either of their faces.
Olivia actually took a step closer, then, her eyes moving over her useless body, as if gauging her. "Give me one good reason why I should help you."
Henry's face floated in front of her eyes again, and again, she pushed it away. She would not beg for mercy using her child, no matter how strong were the pleas of her deepest motherly instincts; mentioning his existence might actually condemn her.
And so she said the only thing she could say.
"I'm you."
This truly was becoming eerily familiar, like a distorted feeling of déjà-vu, and they were both intensely aware of it.
Her Alternate tilted her head, then, biting her lip briefly, still lost in some inner debate.
"I know what you're trying to do," she said eventually, her voice low and stern. "I also know that if the situation was reversed, and I had done to you what you've done to me, you wouldn't even consider giving me a chance right now."
She couldn't say anything to that. Unfortunately, it was probably true.
Hell, it was true.
Olivia took another step closer, then another, until she was literally hovering over her, proving who exactly had the power right now. "But lucky for you, you were actually right about one thing, that night." And she offered her a smile full of disdain that she recognized as her own. "I'm nothing like you."
TBC...
A/N: I can tell they're going to be best friends (or not XD). Next chapter will finally feature some Petah, so hopefully, you'll stay tune for that :D
One thing for sure, you would make this Fringe-less Friday so much more enjoyable by clicking on that 'review' button :)