A/N All Bo and Lauren in this chapter.
Bo
Bo licked her lips. Blood laced her tongue as she sat staring into nothing. It had happened again. Lauren had attacked her in her sleep. This time the Succubus climbed out of bed and left the bed to the Doctor, with no pleading or attempts to wake her up. She found a comfortable seat on the other side of the room and sat staring at the bed. Lauren had stirred a few times and rolled over.
"I'm here." Bo spoke softly. She heard Lauren mumble and settled back in bed.
Bo knows she needs to feed. But that could wait. She knows they need to talk. That would only wait until Lauren is fully awake. Bo sighed quietly. She had been up for hours. What was she doing wrong? Is there some deep seeded hatred of Bo inside of the Doctor? Is she not doing enough to take those nightmares off of Lauren's mind?
She had always been able to play the field so to speak as a Succubus. But right now, she needs to be fully committed to the woman in her bed. Their bed. She wasn't asleep for more than an hour before Lauren punched her. She was rolling over and popped Bo dead in the mouth. It didn't hurt but blood soon ran down her chin. Maybe Lauren is fighting her demons in her sleep. Maybe she's trying to keep those helicopters from exploding. Maybe she's fighting Bo. Maybe she's fighting the Light Fae. Maybe she's fighting Hades. The Succubus has no way of knowing right now. It hurts Bo to see her like this. It will hurt Bo to mention this to Lauren. But they will never move forward if she doesn't.
As a Fae on the run for ten years, Bo never had nightmares. She just woke up to them, next to her in beds, and on warehouse floors. She even had one die in the clubhouse. But a ton of bleach and other cleaning solutions got rid of that smell. She looked at the clock and knew it would be hours before Lauren wakes up from another nightmare or for breakfast. Whichever comes first. She grabbed a thick blanket and settled into the chair. Tonight, she would sleep with one eye open. Tomorrow she would open both eyes with a clear focus.
The next morning.
Bo jumped up when she realized she had probably slept too long. Judging by her heavy breathing, Lauren was still asleep. She stood up and crept out of the room, and downstairs. She wanted to get a shower in, and breakfast started before Lauren finally woke up. She cooked a simple breakfast of bacon, eggs and whole wheat toast. She grabbed a tray and put two plates of food and two glasses of juice on it. Slowly she walked upstairs. She was panting with every step. She wasn't afraid of Lauren. Just what Lauren would think of their talk. She did clean her lip up so that wouldn't stun the Doctor.
"Where were you? Lauren asked after Bo entered the room.
"Making breakfast". Bo replied as she set the tray down on the closest nightstand.
"Ohhh. Okay". Lauren smiled as Bo placed the tray over her lap.
Bo took a seat at the table in the far corner and ate her breakfast. Lauren didn't say much but moaned during every bite. Once they were done, Bo took the tray back downstairs to wash the dishes while Lauren showered. She took some needed breaths as she cleaned every pan, dish and utensil by hand. It was a lot more therapeutic than loading the dishwasher.
She tensed up when she heard footsteps behind her. "Coffee's ready". She said over her shoulder.
"Thanks. I could use a cup or two". Lauren smiled as she went to pour two cups. One for each of them. Bo accepted her cup and took a seat at the dining room table.
"Bo? Lauren said softly.
"Lauren we need to talk". Bo never showed her face yet.
Taking two steps, Lauren walked around to face the Succubus.
"Bo?! Lauren screamed.
"I'm okay". Bo gently waved her concern off.
"Your mouth was not like that last night. I know you didn't leave the house, did you? Lauren asked.
"No. When we went to bed, I stayed there until..." Bo looked away.
"Then I did that.." Lauren gasped as she sunk into the chair in front of Bo.
Bo looked up and the Doctor saw everything in the Succubus eyes. Fear, love and worry.
"Lauren this is not your fault. We just need to talk about it again, and go from there". Bo said quietly.
"What did I do Bo? Lauren cried.
"You just punched me in the mouth that's all. Then I climbed out of bed to give you more room to sleep. I sat in a chair the rest of the night until I fell asleep". Bo slowly moved towards Lauren.
"Bo". Lauren cried.
"Lauren this is not on you. I can always heal from this. I want to help you heal from this." Bo moved to sit closer.
"I can't control my subconscious. I don't know how to heal from this". Lauren slammed her head into her hands.
"Maybe I can use my pulse to send them away for good". Bo suggested.
"The risk with that is, you might wipe out my current memories. My memories of us". Lauren sobbed.
"I'm going to try something okay? Bo reached out to Lauren.
"What and how? Lauren lifted her head.
"I want you to go back to that time in the military. Think of the horrors. When you are thinking of the worst of it, tell me. Then I will pulse your head and see if I can make it all go away". Bo waited for Lauren to decline or to give the go ahead.
"That's dangerous Bo. I might attack you again". Lauren sighed.
"It is worth a try and I can take it. I would go to within an inch of my life for you Lauren". Bo bit her lip to keep from crying. She had to try something. Lauren was hurting and it was long time for Bo to end her suffering or try to.
"Promise me you will defend yourself if it comes to that again". Lauren lifted her head.
"No Lauren. I will never fight you. I may tackle you to the ground, but I will never fight you. It will be okay. I promise". Bo shook off Lauren's violent suggestion.
The Doctor sat back in her chair and took some deep breaths. She looked to Bo once more and closed her eyes. It never took long for her to remember those days. Blood, and dismembered bodies everywhere. Colleagues she'd known forever gone in a matter of minutes. Soldiers that fought to protect the medical staff were killed as well. Screams. Bombs. Fire. Lauren's dry mouth as she lay in her sick bay.
"Go! Lauren screamed as she grabbed her head.
Bo immediately lunged at her and used her strongest pulse ever. It nearly burned her hand. But she would burn her fingers off to help the woman she loves. She stopped when Lauren sat up straight. "Lauren? She said gently.
"I'm okay. I just feel weird." Lauren moved away from Bo.
"Powers check? Bo suggested. She watched as the Doctor moved around the house. Setting small fires and putting them out. Moving things with her fingers and putting them back again. She grabbed a few small weapons and flung them in the air like swords.
Bo stood still waiting for Lauren to finish. She smiled when Lauren seemed to be Lauren. She remembered her. She still had her powers. She didn't lose the Succubus like Lauren feared. "Let's get out of here and get some air. It will help clear whatever cobwebs you have". Bo suggested.
Lauren stretched, and grabbed her keys. Bo followed her and they jumped into Lauren's car. The Doctor sped away at full speed with the wind blowing their hair in every direction. Once they came to an intersection, Lauren stopped and looked around.
"Wherever you want to go is fine with me". Bo squeezed Lauren's hand.
Lauren nodded and made her turn. They drove a few more miles before she turned again. They were on a dirt road and she pulled to a stop. She jumped out of the front seat and climbed into the back. Bo nodded and followed her back there. She settled in the Doctor's arms, and sighed.
Lauren cleared her throat. "When the helicopters exploded, that's where they went. Somewhere out there. Beyond the human eye. Beyond my reach. I couldn't save them. I couldn't even touch them.
That's what hurt the most about it. Me, a Doctor. I couldn't save them. I could not heal their wounds. Their family wounds. I couldn't put the fires out. I couldn't dry their family's tears. All I could do is allow myself to be carried away. To heal my physical wounds. Then when I was, the pain was still there. In the skies that I walked under. In the eyes of survivors that I would never meet. Heirs that should be grown now. Grandchildren that will only know of their grandparents through stories.
You went on a killing spree. Waking up next to dead bodies, night after night. I woke up with the dead next to me too. In my sleep. In my waking hours. They were always there. There when I think of the pipe bombs my brother set off. There when I think of enemy fire taking innocent lives. There when I lost patients. Patients that might have survived had I not failed them. When I was growing up, I thought Doctors were superheroes. I never thought they could lose patients. I never thought people would want us dead. But they aren't and they did. It was not all just in my sleep. It was always in the back of my mind. In the forefront every time I stepped out into public." Lauren whispered in Bo's ear.
"Why didn't you tell me? Bo asked.
Lauren half smiled. "Tell you what? That a human could die at any minute or someday? It's what I was born with. Like your Succubus. It was my nature".
"Lauren I would have taken it all away. Not your life. But the memories. The horrors." Bo squinted at the sky.
"It wasn't your responsibility. I have never told anyone that story. Who would I tell? The Light Fae? Give them something to hold over me? To mock me with? Even the Dark got their shots in." Lauren replied as Bo shifted in her arms.
"Even when we weren't together, you could have told me. Even though I was too selfish to think of anyone but myself. My needs. You needed me. As a friend". Bo frowned. She could almost cry right now.
"What could you have done Bo? You were busy trying to find your mother. To learn who your father was. To help the needy. To help the Detectives. I thought Doctors were superheroes and you were trying to be one". Lauren raised her voice a little more.
"I would have helped you Lauren. I didn't know. I guess I could have asked too". Bo shook her head. She should have. Everyone has a past. What made her think Lauren's was nothing but petri dishes and science fairs?
"It's not your fault Bo. Yes, you could have asked, but I wasn't ready to talk about all of that yet. I only told you my real name, not the rest of my life". Lauren shook the Succubus in her arms.
"You can say it Lauren! I was an ass". Bo snapped.
"I won't say that. But I do agree". Lauren said honestly.
Bo blew out a hard breath. She was in Lauren's arms. But Lauren was never really in hers. She couldn't protect her from her past because she never desired to go there. To talk to her about it. She talked to Kenzi. She went into Dyson's dreams and saw most of his life. Lauren? She left her hanging in the wind. The bitter Fae winds. Lauren had lived alone for most of her adult life. Even with two girlfriends. One in a coma, and one leaving her home. Leaving her to herself, and the bullshit she carried on her shoulders for her past and the Light Fae.
"Why do you love me Lauren? Bo asked.
"What? Lauren replied.
"Why do you love me? Bo asked again.
"Because there is good in you Bo. Real good in you. You have never been like the other Fae. You care. You make mistakes like humans do, but you care. You love. You are not like your bastard father. You can be a lot like Aife, but not overly cruel and as evil as him. You go out of your way to help people. Even if it meant sacrificing parts of your life". Lauren answered.
"You mean sacrificing us". Bo spoke gently.
"You once said you wanted to go slow. I think we rushed. But I don't think we could have gone slow. The heat was there. The fire. The attraction. The need. The hunger. All of it". Lauren gently shifted Bo in her arms.
"I have brought nothing to your life but the same bullshit you have lived with for years. I might as well have been dropping bombs in your life. In your eyes. In your heart". Bo closed her own eyes trying to stave off her tears.
"You didn't know what you were Bo. You couldn't have known. You showed up out of nowhere and tried to fix everything before you even knew you were a Succubus. You thought I was Fae too. We were both strangers living in a strange world. I only knew of the Fae that I had studied up close. I didn't even know about Aife. I only heard stories about her. Never met the woman. Not once." Lauren moved her legs to allow Bo to move a little more.
Bo was out of words. She couldn't think of a single thought. She had all of those fake ids. She was many people. Lauren was two but really only one. A caregiver. A Doctor. She devoted her entire life to Science. Every part of her life centered around the subject. She had not time to play with lovers. Sleep with random strangers. People she met and knew for years. She didn't have forever to live like that. She only had what she had and used it to the best of her ability.
Their break was starting to make more and more sense. If Bo wasn't the one, she needed to find out who was. If Bo couldn't commit, Lauren needed to find someone who could. She didn't have time to sit on her ass waiting for Bo to come around. She didn't even have time to escape the Fae and find a new love without wasting years of her life trying to protect them from the only world she had known for years.
She frowned thinking of how she humiliated Lauren for staying with the Dark. Evony was her stepping-stone out of their world. Her true shot at freedom, without having a fresh out her coma girlfriend tagging along with her. If the Morrigan was still alive, Bo would thank her. She saved Lauren when Bo was too lost in Dyson, Kenzi or Tamsin to save her.
"Well you got awfully quiet". Lauren whispered.
"I'm just piecing this together Lauren. All of this started with me. Long before you met me, it started with me. Had I not shown up you might have been free years ago. Aife wouldn't have shown up to bomb the compound, and you might have been free to leave once the Ash had died. But you stayed. You stayed because of me and I left you. Over and over again, I left you. You had to fight my battle against Nelson because of his girlfriend. You fought alone after that. I left you everywhere alone. Taft's. Evony's. Your lab. Everywhere. They were never going to stop coming for you because you were mine. Long before I came here". Bo froze at the last thought. She would often wonder why she stuck around Toronto. Not really knowing anyone.
"Bo that's a sweet thought. But I really don't think the Ash would have cursed a human just to get to a Succubus. If he wanted to, he would have cursed me the minute you arrived." Lauren squeezed Bo.
"But it fits. Think about it. On some intuitive level he could have known I was out there all along. Found someone that read auras and saw something in you that nobody else did. He sent you to me that night before our feelings had ever been spoken into existence. I am sorry I didn't notice that then or appreciate the significance of it because I do now. He probably noticed it that first day in his throne room. That's my story Doctor and I am sticking to it. Not as destiny, but as belonging". Bo smiled softly.
Lauren raised an eyebrow. Bo did have some good points. But being a scientist, there was nothing conclusive about her evidence. The Fae had never taken an interest in Lauren's love life until the Ash sent her to Bo. But even then it was only a mission of distracting the Succubus. She could have shown Bo porn movies. Taken her out to a movie. Anything but sleep with her. The Doctor rolled her tongue in her mouth. She really could have run. She could have pulled Nadia's plug and left. She had the experience to hide. The experience to hide her scent from Dyson who would have assuredly searched for her, for the Ash. Not for Bo. Never for Bo.
But this bigger than a territorial wolf. It's bigger than anything in her Fae research. The truth was in her reach and now in her arms. Dyson hated her. Rainer hated her, if he never spoke to her directly. Hades hated her knowing she could get to his Succubus. Touch his Succubus. The same woman that touched something else in Bo, and vice versa.
"Well that kiss we shared was probably something Hades predicted years ago. Long before he killed me, and I kept his powers. So, if he worked all of this into existence. Then we owe to him to give it a good and long shot". Lauren smiled wide.
"I like that". Bo smiled as she leaned back against Lauren and closed her eyes. Lauren always made her see stars but right now the Doctor is her sunshine.
TBC