Song: The Script - No Good In Goodbye

This is dedicated to all the fans of The Big Bang Theory. The 12th and final season premiers on Monday 24 September. I grew very attached to the series and the cast over the last 11 years, so I'm sad to see it end; but all things must come to an end so...

The first bit of this chapter is a scene I deleted from the last chapter but going forward, I realised it's kind of necessary. So this is the end scene from Chapter 38 from Nathan's POV.

"You SCU guys get all the fun toys," Michael commented as one of the Special Crimes Unit agents, Amelia, explained the function of the gadget in her hand. 

It was a scanning device, square in shape and about half a metre in length and width with a screen in the centre, that could pick up movement, heartbeat and respiration through a wall. They'd settled on using the device after a short argument on a plan of action to save the hostages that they now believed to be in the concealed room under H.B Media. Besides showing them how many people were in the room, the device would also give them each person's position so they wouldn't attack blindly.

"All clear on the plan?" Nathan asked the group of twenty law enforcers surrounding him, as he checked the sidearm he'd been assigned for the umpteenth time.

Michael nodded, pointing at the woman holding the scanner. "Amelia's going to go quietly down the stairs, sticking to the wall for cover and she'll stop just before the bend that leads into the room. Once she attaches the scanner to the wall, it will transmit the image showing the number of people present and their positions to this tablet, then we plan our infiltration accordingly before going down there as quietly as possible. Once we're in position, power to the building will be cut, we go in fast, using these night vision goggles from the SCU to see in the dark. Everyone got that?"

The twenty men and women, a combination of SCU agents and their own police department, nodded their understanding. Satisfied, he gave Amelia the go ahead to descend then turned to Nathan.

"You good?"

Nathan gave him a questioning look in response.

"Seeing someone you care about in danger is hard and in situations like these, our judgement can be a little off. Are you sure you can handle being in there?"

"I'll be fine," Nathan said curtly, putting on his goggles and looking around. Everything was painted in a cloudy, green hue.

"This person," Michael paused to clear his throat. "Claire. She's Natasha's twin. You'll be fine with shooting at a person who looks like a girl you care about, if it comes to that?"

"You and I know this case better than anyone here and of the two of us, I'm better at negotiating in a hostage situation. You'd just piss Claire off, so you need me in there. I'm not going to have a meltdown and risk the lives of two hostages and whatever the hell Lilian Evans is."

A beeping sound from the tablet in Michael's hand interrupted their conversation. The screen showed a grid on a white background. On one end of the grid, a red and orange blob blinked on and off the screen. Three similar shapes also showed halfway up the screen, with two of them very close together. Amelia's partner from the SCU explained that the shapes were heat signatures of people in the room picked up by the scanner and from the looks of it, the people were on opposite ends of the room.

Relieved that everyone was still alive, Nathan said, "Lilian and Claire are both armed. When the lights go off, we'll have a very short time to get in and disarm them before they panic and do something rash like shoot randomly. We could assume the person standing on her own on this side of the room close to the entrance is Claire. Since she's the one holding hostages, the positioning would make sense."

"If that's the case, disarming her will be easy since she's closest to the entrance," Michael said, before dividing everyone into four groups of five people each. "My group and I will head for her when the lights go off while you and the others get the other three."

Nathan didn't argue his decision to keep him away from Claire and after stressing the importance of speed for their rescue mission, they descended the stairs, one at a time. The further they went down the stairs, the clearer they heard voices coming from the room, although they weren't clear enough to hear what was being said.

The signal for the power to be cut was the last thing he was completely conscious of before running into the room. As per their plan, he blew past the person nearest the entrance, focusing his attention on the other end of the room. He stopped short at the green tinted sight in front of him, stretching out his hands as a signal to the others to halt.

On one side of the wall, Kelsey was on the floor, tied up and looking worse for wear. Naomi and her group reached her and began cutting away her restraints. Natasha was standing on the other side, still in the dress she'd been wearing when he last saw her, with her legs bound at the ankles and her hands held behind her back.

All feelings of relief disappeared instantly. The hand holding a gun pressed to her side was the first thing he noticed about Claire and when he finally looked up at her face, he did a double take. Even though he'd known what to expect, now that it was right in front of him, it felt unreal.

"Whoever you are, don't come any closer or I will shoot her!" Claire shouted into the darkness.

Nathan and the others in his group stood completely still. The only way they could disarm Claire was by overpowering her, but the gun's positioning and her proximity to Natasha made things complicated.

He allowed himself a brief glance at Natasha's face and had to grip the gun in his hand tighter to keep himself from reaching for her. She looked pale and frail and some sort of bandage was tied around her head, keeping her hair off her face. Her forehead seemed swollen and she wore a blank expression; as if she wasn't really seeing what was going on or where she was. Forcing his gaze away from her, he focused on Claire.

"I'm Detective Henderson," he said, looking around to try to figure out an executable plan of action. 

Behind him, Lily protested loudly as Michael handcuffed her. Over at Kelsey's side, Naomi was signalling to him. Taking advantage of the fact that Claire couldn't see anything in the dark, he gestured subtly to her, signalling for her not to do anything until he could establish Claire's mindset.

"Well, isn't this a nice surprise," Claire said, moving slightly backwards towards the wall and taking Natasha with her.

"Do you mind if we talk for a bit Claire?"

"You know my name?"

"Yes. Yes, I do," Nathan said, pleased that she was engaging with him. He signaled to Naomi to start moving towards Claire. "I'd like to make a deal with you Claire. I'll put my gun down, if you'll do the same, so we can talk for a minute."

"We've met before, you know," she said, ignoring his request.

Her statement confused him, but he didn't miss a beat and continued the conversation. Naomi was only a few steps away now. He only needed to get Claire to move the gun away from Natasha even for a second.  "Can you tell me more about that?"

"Outside Bootleggers in Crenshaw," Claire went on. "You were lying on a pile of trash, drunk as hell and clutching a bottle of meds."

His heart skipped a beat. He knew the night she was referring to. The only person he'd told about it was Natasha, but he hadn't even shared specifics of the name of the bar, so how was it possible that Claire knew about it? 

"You kept calling me Carey and blaming yourself for my 'death' and I went along with it until I took the pills from you," she went on, then let out a light laugh. "If I'd just let you die then, I wouldn't have come here and none of this would have happened."

As she said this, she tightened her hold on Natasha's hands, who immediately started struggling against her, distress showing on her face.

"Hold still if you don't want to die," Claire hissed at her, but she didn't stop fidgeting.

Naomi was right behind Claire now. If she made a move now while Natasha was still aggravating Claire, it would end in disaster. Shelving his shock at Claire's revelation, he tried talking to Natasha to calm her down, while signalling to Naomi to hold her position, but Natasha didn't seem to be hearing him either. 

She threw her head back, knocking into Claire who fell back, caught by surprise by the impact, and stumbled into Naomi. Her finger already on the trigger, pressed down on it in the moment of chaos and by the time Nathan lunged for Natasha, the bullet had hit her, burrowing into her side.

He caught her before she hit the ground, lifting her into his arms. She blinked into the darkness and a shuddering breath escaped her lips as her eyes closed. 

Then, there was silence.

***

For a moment, he wished he couldn't understand the words he was hearing. The bliss of ignorance would be so much more welcome than the gnawing feeling of dread spreading through every part of his body as he listened to Natasha's injuries being listed.

Blunt force trauma to the head.

Concussion and swelling in the brain.

Abrasions on heels and shins.

Bruising on upper arms.

Cuts on wrists and ankles.

Single gunshot wound to the side.

It all sounded like the highlights of a postmortem, than a report of injuries. Unable to stomach anymore, he turned on his heel, walking briskly away from Mrs Harris who was relaying the information she'd gathered from the doctors to him, Kelsey and Michael. He'd almost made it past the five or so other uniformed officers who'd accompanied them to the hospital, when Michael caught up to him, blocking his path.

"Where're you going?"

"To the station to do my job."

"I don't think that's a good idea."

"Why the hell not?"

"Do you honestly want to question Claire and hear her talk about how she murdered people in cold blood when she looks like that? It'll just mess you up and you have enough to worry about as it is," Michael tried to reason with him.

He didn't respond, moving instead to sidestep him but Michael, persistent as ever, mirrored his movements. He glared at him and tried again with no success, until he angrily pushed him.

"Get out of my way!" he yelled. A couple of their colleagues moved forward to intervene but Michael waved them off, standing his ground.

"Look at your shirt," he instructed him, calmly.

Nathan defiantly kept his angry gaze on him, chest heaving up and down with every harsh breath he took.

"Look. At. Your. Shirt."

The anger ebbed away, giving way to a raw pain that clawed at his chest and threatened to bring him to his knees, but he remained adamant. Michael grabbed his hands and held them up to his face, forcing him to look at the blood staining them.

The sight brought with it an awareness of the cold, wet stickiness seeping through his shirt that he'd been ignoring. Finally looking down, he saw Natasha's blood covering most of the front part of his shirt from when he'd carried her out of the room and held onto her all the way to the hospital.

"You need to clean up and take a breath. I'm going to the station right now and I'll get you the answers you need. You have my word." With that, Michael summoned Naomi, instructing her to drive Nathan home and keep an eye on him.

***

An hour passed while he stood under the shower in his apartment, watching her blood flow down his skin and swirl down the drain. He stared at it until only little pink spots on his skin remained. Heart heavy, he scrubbed them out and once he was done and dressed in a clean t-shirt and jeans, he hastily left the bedroom, running from the memory of her that filled it.

He found Naomi tinkering in the kitchen and ignored her offer to make him food as he walked over to the table, which was just as he'd left it, bloody knife and all. Gathering everything into a paper bag, he asked Naomi to take him to the station.

She'd barely parked the car when he jumped out and headed inside, leaving her to park hastily and run after him. By the time she caught up to him, he'd found his target.

Lily was sitting alone in one of the interrogation rooms, handcuffed to the table and looking noticeably less primped up.

"Thank goodness you're here. Get these things off me, I need to see my daughter," she said when he walked up to her.

Anger radiated off him as he stared at her silently, struggling to reign in his fury. She raised an eyebrow at him, glancing briefly at Naomi fidgeting at the door.

"You know I shouldn't be in here, handcuffed to a table like a common criminal. I was forthcoming with vital information about this case and..."

His restraint snapped and he dumped the contents of the bag on the table. The clattering sound drowned out the rest of her sentence. She took one look at the objects in front of her, before returning her gaze to him.

"Detective..."

"This was your plan all along, wasn't it?" he said in a deathly calm voice.

She stared up at him in confusion as Naomi slipped out of the room.

"You came to me with your crazy tale and seemingly sincere confessions, so that when the whole thing blew up, and you knew it was about to, any judge would be obliged to acknowledge you as a cooperating witness and you'd get a good deal for a shorter sentence or none at all."

"I don't know what..."

"Enough!" Nathan shouted over whatever she wanted to say, making her flinch. "Enough of the manipulations and the mind games and the underhanded plans! You knew Claire had her, didn't you? When you broke into my apartment to get 'help' you knew and you thought of covering your bases first, even though she was in the hands of a killer," he went on, gaining momentum with every word he spoke.

Lily wisely kept her mouth shut.

"She could die!" he shouted, voice cracking as the gravity of what he'd said hit him. "She could die," he repeated, in a heartbroken whisper.

Michael appeared next to him and pulled him out of the room while Naomi returned the objects on the table into their bag.

"I thought you were the level headed one, Henderson. If you're going to start following in my footsteps, then this station is doomed," he said when he got him outside. "I told you to keep him away from here," he said, now turning to Naomi who'd joined them again.

"You said keep an eye on him, not handcuff him to his apartment door," she said indignantly. She held out a folded piece of paper to him. "You dropped this in there."

Michael took it, rubbing his temples as he eyed Nathan. "I wasn't sure if I should tell you about this, and now that you've completely lost it, I'm absolutely sure I shouldn't tell you about it."

"What is that?" he asked, curious and relatively calmer.

Michael sighed, passing the paper to him. "Another thing to add to this case's pile of messed up crap."

He opened it, taking a quick glance then frowned. "What the...?"

"We got Miranda Kingsely's address from the 'good' judge and asked Crenshaw Police to call in on her. She was found dead, sitting in a car with a pipe from the exhaust feeding gas into the car and it looks like she's been dead a while. This letter was found in there with her, addressed to Claire, so they scanned it over."

"Dead a while, you said?" Nathan said, eyes going back to the one way mirror into Lily's room.

Michael followed his gaze, nodding. "Crenshaw's lab is shit so we've been trying to get authorization for the body to be brought here so Lydia can take a look at it and figure out when she died and if it really was suicide. From the contents of that letter and everything you told me about Lilian's past...I don't know."

Curiosity peaked, he read the letter.

My Sweet Baby Girl

Lately I've been craving the absence of everything. It's not a new feeling. I've had these thoughts before of wanting an escape from everything. I'd apologize but 'sorry' is just an empty word. I'm at peace with my choice and it's one of the things in my life that I don't regret. The other is you. I wish I'd been a better mother for you.

I'm tired. Mostly of pretending. Pretending that I'm a good mother, or in general, a good person. A good person wouldn't have run over an innocent, young girl intentionally to keep her quiet. A good person wouldn't have done many things that I've done.

I wish I'd let Lily take you when she offered. You'd have grown in a better home and not suffered for my sins and misconceptions. Perhaps now that I'm gone you can search her out. I'm sure she'll help you, she's a kind person. I never deserved her kindness, especially since I was the one who killed her husband and tried to frame Henry for it. I suppose that's where it began. My misguided attempt to own the heart of a man who loved another. Sometimes I wish I'd never met Henry, but without him, I wouldn't have you.

I made so many mistakes. And every time I tried to fix them, things got worse. I'm doing this so it can all stop, so you can start again without my sins tainting your life.

I love you so much, my Claire-Bear.

***

Nathan didn't argue when Michael suggested that he go home while he questioned Claire. He had a lot to process. After six years blaming himself for his sister's death, he finally knew the truth, or some semblance of it. He was sure Miranda had run Carey over but he still didn't know why, so he had to wait for Claire's interrogation transcript to find out. And then he would have to figure out a way to tell his mother about it.

Four hours had passed since he'd left the hospital, but the feeling of dread still plagued him. He was pleasantly surprised when he was told Natasha's visitors were limited to the people on a list that Kelsey and her mother had compiled and he was at the top of the list.

He held his breath as he opened the door to her room in the ICU and stepped in. The nurse had warned him to be prepared for what he would see, but nothing could have prepared him for the sight that met him. 

Her bed was surrounded by all manner of tubing and machinery, some of which he recognized thanks to his short term at Medical School. The equipment was the least shocking though. Her face was puffy and swollen, so much that she was barely recognizable. And to add to that, a section of her hair, close to her left temple had been shaved off and several stitches protruded from that exposed part of her scalp.

He pulled a chair up to the bed, careful not to disturb the many cables and tubes trailing across the floor, and took her hand in his, pressing it to his lips. 

In that moment; as he looked at her swollen, purplish face, saying a silent prayer for her to be okay, it hit him. He'd fallen for her. Beyond reason or logic or sense, while he was completely unaware, this girl had claimed his heart.

***

He only realized he'd drifted off to sleep when the buzzing of his phone cut into the silence and woke him up. Shaking his head to rid himself of the momentary disorientation, he stood, crossing to the other side of the room to answer the call from Michael. The increased beeping of the ECG tore his focus away from Michael's news about Claire's transcript and he glanced back at Natasha. The swelling had gone down a bit while he'd slept, enough that he could see her hazel eyes perfectly now that she was awake.

Relief filled him and he hung up on Michael mid-sentence, approaching her with a smile.

"Hi," he said, but his smile quickly faded as the ECG went haywire and a frown replaced the initial confusion on her face.

"You're okay, just calm down. I'll get a nurse to..."

He'd barely taken a step towards the door when she let out a desperate scream. It came out hoarse and scratchy, hardly loud enough for him to hear, even though he was right next to her. Her attempted scream turned into a fit of coughs and a nurse ran in, pushing Nathan aside as she tried to calm Natasha down. Another one came in, rushing to a table on the other side of the bed were several injections were. She picked one up and injected it into the drip feeding into her right arm.

The ECG started beeping slowly and Natasha began to calm down but her fear filled, bloodshot eyes remained on Nathan, and as one of the nurses ushered him out he heard her say, "That man. He shot me. He shot me. He shot me."

***

It was morning now. Natasha had been sedated again and they didn't expect her to be up for a couple more hours, so Nathan took a cab back to the station. It gave him a chance to run through what had happened with Natasha in the hospital. The only logical explanation he could think of was that back in the hidden room, she'd seen him come to her and Claire with his gun raised and somehow thought he had shot her. But then he remembered the lights were off, so she couldn't have seen him and she'd been out of it the whole time he was talking to Claire.

He dropped off at the Station, head ringing and went in search of Michael, whom he found in their office. Without wasting time on details, he updated him on her condition, then asked for the transcript.

"I'll be at the front desk if you need me," Michael said. He paused at the door, hesitantly until Nathan gave him a questioning look. "Claire said she'd only talk about Carey with you."

Without a word, Nathan nodded then settled at his desk and started reading. He skimmed over information he already knew, searching for anything new and skipping over Michael's questions and comments.

[C.K] : I met Max about six months ago after he'd beat the crap out of Natasha and I chased him down. He thought I was her ghost until I punched some sense back into him. We talked, I told him who I was and asked him questions about Natasha. I told him to keep my existence to himself, in return for me not ratting him out about what he did to Natasha. See, we both thought he'd killed her.

Anger stirred within him as he remembered the day Natasha told him about that particular attack on her. She was never going to get justice for that, now that Max was dead. Shaking away the depressing thoughts, he went back to reading.

[C.K] : I went back to Crenshaw with a lot of questions for my mother.  She told me she'd lost Natasha, who she knew as Amy, a day after we were born due to some birth complications and I realized there was a lot more to the story. It seemed pointless to tell her I'd seen Natasha since at the time, I believed she was dead, and I didn't want to put my mother through that again.

[C.K] : I asked more questions and she told me about her affair with Henry, how he'd tried to kill her when she told him she was pregnant and how Lilian had saved her life and taken care of her until we were born. It was obvious she didn't know Natasha was actually alive, which meant Lily wasn't the saint my mother thought she was. And I recalled Max mentioning his last name was Bandieer, so with this new information, I came back to Pinehive.

[C.K] : I called Max when I got to town and asked to meet him. He parked in a quiet part of town and we sat in his car and talked. He told me Natasha was still alive after all, and Henry had paid her off to keep quiet about him hurting her. I lost all respect for her after that.

[C.K] : Eventually he opened up that he'd just recently found out Henry wasn't his father and the man wanted to throw him out of his house along with his mother, or even kill them. Apparently Lilian had something to do with Henry finding out the truth about Max's paternity. I told him my grievances with Henry and we made a plan to kill him. With Henry dead, Max would keep his inheritance and I would avenge my mother. 

[C.K] : Punishing Lily directly was near impossible, so Max suggested using Natasha to get to her. So I took the spare keys I'd seen being hidden in a plant  by the door, went in when the house was empty, found her room and searched for the gun.

[C.K] : I found it in a box, along with a  torn up check from Henry for half a million dollars. It didn't make sense to me that she'd demand a payoff from Henry and then tear up the check before she'd cashing it. Now I wasn't sure just how trustworthy Max was since his information seemed off. I still took the gun though.

[C.K] : I wasn't sure what to do. Something told me, Natasha hadn't asked for that payoff which gave me  more motivation to kill Henry for taking advantage of her while she was vulnerable. It felt like Ben all over again. He was my stepfather. I killed him too.

[C.K] : I knew Max wouldn't believe me and I had to convince him I was still framing Natasha, so I went back to Crenshaw and had some friends help me find a gun that looked like Natasha's in appearance, in case Max asked to see it and he remembered what the gun Natasha had pulled on him looked like.

[C.K] : When I came back, Max showed me the room under H.B media so I could stay there. There's another hidden door that leads into a passage, opening up into Henry's office. I stayed there for a while, eating candy and snacks from the vending machines.

The candy wrappers and water bottles they'd found in the room the night they discovered it made sense to him now.

[C.K] : On the glorious day I rid the world of Henry, I wore a wig and loads of makeup, hoping he wouldn't mistake me for Natasha since he'd met her once. He fell for the trap and took me to his home. He was paranoid about hotels and other people's apartments and cameras so that worked to my advantage. I shot him before he could get his grimy hands on me. The look on his face...He recognized me -well Natasha, really- before I killed him.

[C.K] : Max picked me up. When they found Henry's body, he was pissed I didn't leave Natasha's gun there like we'd originally planned. Even more so when he found out I used a completely different gun. That's when he got his family to pull the whole eye-ball thing, but because of the wig and all,  it obviously didn't work since Natasha was cleared, which pissed him off even more and the idiot tried to strangle her and got arrested.

[C.K] : I told him to leave Natasha and Lilian to me and everything was fine until he got arrested again. This time Lilian meant business. I was happy to let him rot in prison, but he kept texting me from there, threatening to expose me if I didn't get him released by pretending to be Natasha and dropping the charges against him.

[C.K] : At the same time, Lilian was trying to blackmail me with evidence from Ben's murder so I'd return to Crenshaw. So I killed Macmillan with a knife from Lilian's house to prove a point to Max and send a message to Lilian. I went into his office, which used to be Henry's, through the hidden tunnel and pretended to be Natasha when he came in. He thought I was there to talk about his testimony or something in the assault case against Max, so I went along with it.

[C.K] : But then he did something strange. He made a couple of calls. During the first call, he asked for the cameras in the building to be turned off and then in the next, he told everyone to leave the building. To me, he said he wanted us to talk in private which I didn't believe, because his office had no cameras anyway. How much more private could it get than that?

[C.K] : He proved my suspicions right when he said, he couldn't testify anymore because of something to do with his mother and that's why he hadn't showed up for some meeting that day. Basically he was chickening out of doing right by Natasha, after his brother had almost killed her. I got bored, stopped listening and stabbed him. Then I lured Natasha there to take the fall for it and when she went into the building, I put his phone in her car. You already know how this one ends.

[C.K] : At the time Max escaped from prison, I was sleeping in Natasha's house. She was never home and Lilian was still hiding in Crenshaw. The only person I ever saw was Danielle and I tried avoiding her as much as possible so she wouldn't get suspicious. Then Max showed up that night. 

[C.K] : I was genuinely shocked to see him, and somehow he believed I was Natasha because he was all apologetic and begged me to talk to him and he said something about her calling him. He said he was leaving town for good and his mother and biological father had already left, separately. He couldn't leave because of the police at the city borders, so he needed help. 

[C.K] : If I got him outside the city, he promised to share the location of a letter he'd written exposing 'the killer.' He hinted that he'd hidden it in the house when I'd left him alone for a few minutes while I went to the kitchen to figure out which knife I could hide in my clothes and then stab him with when he wasn't looking. All the sharp ones were too big for my pockets, so I had to use the gun.

[C.K] : I told him the police were going to drop by to check on me in a few minutes and I sent him upstairs while I supposedly got rid of the police. He went upstairs, I switched on the stereo, turned the volume up, followed him upstairs and shot him with Natasha's gun. It felt like poetic justice. 

[C.K] : I don't claim to be good. All the men I killed were horrible people, who did terrible things or covered up the terrible crimes of  other horrible people. I don't regret it and I'd do it all over again.

***

Over the next eight hours, Nathan buried himself in the mountain of paperwork for the case, while he avoided calls from Kimberly, Stacey and even his mother. 

He forced himself to take a break when he started seeing double, and went back to the hospital. A different nurse was on duty at the front desk and this time he was told no visitors were allowed to see Natasha. Confused and frustrated by her refusal to share any information with him about her condition, he paced around the waiting room, debating how hard it would be to sneak into her room. He needed to see her and set things straight. She was the only calm in the storm that was beating at him every which way.

To his surprise, Joyce walked into the waiting room, coming from the hospital wards. When she spotted him, she walked right over.

"What are you doing here?"

"I was called to consult on a patient," she replied. "I believe you know her. Natasha Evans."

He nodded. "Can you get me in to see her?"

"You're Natasha's Ned, aren't you?" she asked, not responding to his request.

"What?"

Joyce gestured to the chairs and they sat, far away from everyone else in the waiting room.

"Your partner sent me this last night," she said, handing him her phone while she re-tied her mass of long, wavy red hair.

The text on the screen read: Need you at the Station. To cut a long story short; Nathan has feelings for Natasha, and tonight she got shot right in front of him. So now he's out terrorizing the village. Come fix him.

"Your partner seems to think I'm some sort of mechanic," she rolled her eyes, taking back her phone. "Natasha mentioned you during our first session at the Station, but she called you Ned." 

"Oh?"

Her expression turned solemn. "She doesn't remember me or that session. In fact, she doesn't remember a lot."

"What?" he asked, hoping he'd heard wrong.

"Did she ever tell you about her nightmares?"

"Yeah, why?"

"The nurses told me a man had been to see her and when she woke up and first saw him, she freaked out and said he was the man who shot her. I was told that man was you."

Nathan confirmed with a nod.

"I talked to her about it and asked how she was so sure you shot her and she said she remembered it. But the way she was describing the whole thing sounded like the nightmare she told me about before. I believe she's confusing her nightmares with reality. Perhaps the reality of what happened is hard for her to comprehend, so she's blocking it out and subconsciously choosing an alternate reality that's less traumatic. She doesn't remember who you are, so right now you're just a man who shot her."

This explanation felt worse than his assumption that in the chaos of her rescue, she'd confused events in her mind and thought he'd shot her. What if she never remembered him at all?

"I didn't tell her it was a nightmare. She's still not out of the woods yet so she doesn't need to be stressing about not remembering stuff. That's why I recommended that she doesn't get visitors for now. In her nightmares, she kills two people she cares about and if she sees them alive, it might confuse and overwhelm her."

"Will she get her memory back though?"

"With time, probably. Physically, she's still on the mend. Emotionally, I think she's blocking out a lot of traumatic stuff hence the temporary amnesia. I'm going to be spending time with her to help her bring down the barriers, but it could take a while. In the meantime, I'm afraid you can't see her since she still believes you tried to kill her."

***

Perhaps this book should have been The Untold Stories?

This was getting too long which is why I cut Claire's transcript into chunks. I'm sorry if it felt like an info dump, it was either that or 50 000 words in this chapter. Maybe I'll post the full transcript as a bonus chapter at the end, if anyone's interested in it.

One more chapter to go! Fair warning, some things are going to be cut out or mentioned in passing and only the important stuff will be written in full or else I'll be writing this for the next 50 years, lol.

Thank your for your patience!