A/N: This is my second fic for this category. It's a bit longer and spans a little more of a possible continuation of the movie. It's another sort of study of George, and his relationship with Scarlett, and how he learns to cope with what they've been through. Enjoy! R&R! Thanks! ~Mac

Disclaimer: I don't own As Above So Below.

With A Braver Heart

George comes to a conclusion later, when they're safe in a hotel room. He's supposed to be sleeping, but he can't get out of his head. So, he keeps thinking and thinking, and eventually he comes to a conclusion. Scarlett is in possession of the best week of his life and the worst day of his life—and that's too much good and too much bad wrapped up in a single, beautiful person. He can't handle that kind of imbalance, not now, not after everything.

Half of him, the part of him that remembers that week in Turkey, before the jail cell, that remembers what it felt like to look at Scarlett and feel only happiness, that remembers the feeling that the world started and stopped in her fingertips, the corners of her lips, and the inside of her elbow where he used to rest his head to sleep, wants to stay. That part of him is clouded over by his love for her. He should want to stay by her side, to battle everything the world sends at them with her, but every time he sees that future spread out in front of him, the other half of him seizes control.

That half of him, the part of him that remembers the darkness and the dirt, and the blood, that remembers the gut wrenching horror of being down there in the hell created for them, that remembers what it felt like to have life slowly slipping away from him, wants to get as far away from her as possible. Remembering all of that with her beside him is a prison worse than the cell in Turkey. He can't bear it and his love for her is not enough to carry it for him.

So, while she sleeps beside him, somehow finding a peace that eludes him, he watches her for one last pivotal moment before he goes. He commits her to memory—her fingertips, the corners of her lips that he longs to kiss one last time and the curve of her elbow that he wishes could cradle him to her again—because he thinks, maybe, he'll never see her again.

When it comes down to the central question of fight or flight, the answer is simple. George runs.

0o0

When he is alone in that city, walking the streets with no particular direction, panic starts to set in. How is he supposed to survive on his own after what he's been through? It's almost enough to send him running back to her side, but he squashes it down. He has no where to go, but he can't go back.

Scarlett is a reminder, worse than the scars left behind when he crawled out of the cave his brother died in which never fully healed. She is the hooded figures, their stone attackers, the streams of blood. She is the smell of death and decay, of fire and brimstone. She is the dizzy sensation of dying, of claustrophobia, and the crippling fear that there's no escaping that hell. She brings him back there every time he looks at her and he loves her still.

That's why he has to go. It's self preservation. Even if it means being alone for the rest of his life, because no one else understands and the one who understands will be his ruin if he stays.

0o0

First he finds his way out of the city, then he finds his way out of the country, and as an added measure, he leaves the continent behind too. It's not until he's on a transatlantic flight, thousands of miles above and away from her, that he lets himself think about her and what she's doing now without him.

George wonders what Scarlett did when she woke up and realized he was gone. Did she assume that he would be back? Did she go looking for him? Did she panic when she couldn't find him? Did she feel the way that he felt sitting in that Turkish jail cell when he realized that she wasn't coming back for him? He doesn't want her to be hurt or scared, but he can't be there to comfort her when he can't find comfort himself. He hopes that she understands, that she'll forgive him for not being strong enough. He certainly doesn't need another black mark tarnishing his record. He already knows what fate he's destined for, that's part of the problem.

He forces himself to stay awake, even as all the other passengers' eyes begin to droop and they nod off one by one. Soon, he's practically the only person conscious on the plane besides the flight staff. The cabin fills with the soft sounds of sleep, the evidence of peaceful dreaming. There is no peace for him, not even when he closes his eyes. So, he pinches himself to stay alert. The last thing he needs is to doze off, only to wake up screaming like he's being dragged away by teeth and claws. This would be the worst place for him to succumb to nightmares: in a plane full of people, gliding over an ocean. By the time they land, he's ready to collapse from exhaustion. He can't remember the last time he slept more than a few minutes or ate more than a few bites. His plan had been to keep moving, but he can barely stand or see straight, so he checks into the hotel beside the airport instead. He knows that hoping for rest is still futile, but he doesn't have much of a choice.

When he crawls beneath the blankets of the hotel bed and sinks into the mattress, he starts to miss her. She would be able to warm his cold sheets with her sheer passionate heat. He wants her arms and legs, her hands and fingers, her lips and tongue; he wants them all wrapped around his. It is not unexpected. It's a longing that was already there. It has been since Turkey and only grown stronger with time and circumstance. It's one of many thinks he'll have to learn to live with.

He sleeps only because he has no energy left. His body shuts down and he is thrust into unconsciousness rather unceremoniously.

He gets two noise complaints when not even utter exhaustion can keep his eyes closed on the grotesque images his mind is dredging up for him. He checks out before dawn with deep, dark circles under his eyes and no idea where he's going to go from here.

0o0

It's nearly impossible to assimilate back into normal life. Not just because he's been through something so traumatic that all he can think about when he sees other people is that they have no clue what real torture is, but because he can't get into a regular schedule when he can't sleep for more than twenty to thirty minutes at a time. He can't work, because he can't think straight with his brain foggy from sleep deprivation. He can't be social, because his zombie like gait and sunken in appearance scares off anyone who might approach him. Also, because he resents people who can do things like be irritable because they got seven hours and fifty five minutes of sleep instead of the recommended eight hours, or hold a normal conversation without imagining what sins would come back to haunt the other when the time came. He can't do anything without something from that night seeping in to taint it.

That doesn't stop him from trying, though. He puts up a good front for awhile. He fools many into believing that he hasn't seen past the veil between life and death. The best he can possibly do is keep people convinced that he didn't suffer something horrible in Paris. Any more than that would be too much.

0o0

A psychiatrist would say he's depressed. George knows it's more than that. When they were down there, he fought to survive. He wasn't ready for his life to be over. There was not a second that he wasn't grateful that Scarlett had managed to save him. Until they were out. Now, he's lost that survival instinct. The will to carry on in spite of what has happened is just gone. Life as he knew it was over before he ever made it out of the catacombs, and, this new life he has to live? He doesn't want it.

A psychiatrist would say he's suicidal, but George knows it's more than that.

First of all, he would never kill himself. There have been moments when the idea occurred to him, but when that happens, he thinks of Scarlett and her father. Even though he expects to never see or talk to her again, he knows it'll get back to her somehow if he ever chose to end his life. She'll find out and she'll blame herself. She'll blame herself for dragging him into her quest. She'll blame herself for the circumstances that forced him into the catacombs. She'll blame herself for everything that followed. And, she'll blame herself for falling asleep and letting him leave, because losing him in the world means that she couldn't be there to stop him. The guilt would eat away at her, and he doesn't want her to go through that twice in one lifetime.

Besides, he doesn't actually want to kill himself. It's more that he's come to the conclusion that he might not have minded so much if he hadn't made it out that night, if Scarlett had been too late and he had died down there—because it would mean he wouldn't have to live like this. Maybe he's retrospectively suicidal, it there's such a thing. It's the clarity of hindsight and all that.

So, for better or for worse, he's alive and he's going to continue to be alive, even if this half life he's been granted is more of a curse than a blessing.

0o0

Sometimes, he dreams of her. Not monsters or demons. Not gore and violence. Not hell and damnation. Just Scarlett, just her and the brilliant light that feels like heaven. Those nights, when his head is filled with her, are simultaneously the best and worst nights. The best, because they are a reprieve from the nightmares that torment him relentlessly. And the worst, because he wakes up feeling momentarily, blissfully happy and the second he opens his eyes, it's all torn away, and he's returned to this bleak reality.

George knows it was his choice, that he doomed himself to this isolation, but regret still has a cold and devastating bite.

0o0

George makes a mistake coming into this particular diner in this particular town. He's done his best to avoid people recently, but his hunger wins out when he catches the smell of warm maple syrup and freshly cooked bacon as he passed by. He picks a booth in the back of the place, keeping distance between himself and the rest of the people enjoying their morning meals. His plan is to actually eat a decent meal as quickly as etiquette allows him and then leave. Living off the grid is easy enough as long as he keeps moving, never giving himself enough time to settle. This is a rare moment of indulgence.

His plan is foiled by his waitress. She is the first person in a fifty mile radius to give him more than a cursory glance. Granted, it is her job to provide him the 'exceptional customer service' the window displays promise, but he only needs a single glance at her to see that she oozes of Southern charm and hospitality. She eyes him up and down and her face wrinkles in concern. He recognizes that look instantly. He saw it a lot on people's faces after Danny died. It's part sympathy, part pity, and part empty promises. People see the grief etched into his skin and they want to ease his pain, even though they know nothing they say is going to fix what's now in the past. It never stops them from trying though.

Perhaps she sees the panic in his eyes, because she doesn't say anything right away. She takes his order and leaves him alone in favor of checking in on her other tables. He thinks he might have dodged a bullet when she brings him his food without a word besides generic bidding to enjoy his meal and to let her know if he needed anything else. But she returns with more than just his tab when she sees that he's cleaned his plates.

The waitress gently places the tab on the table and slides it toward him. He goes to take it, but her french tipped nails keep it held in place. "How was everything, darlin'?"

"Great," George clears his throat. "Delicious, all of it."

"I'm glad you enjoyed it," she says, but still doesn't relinquish her old on his tab. "You look like you're having a rough time of it, dear. Can I ask what's got you wrecked so badly?"

He has never understood the concept of asking to ask a question, especially when the request already includes what the person wants to know. What they're really asking is if you're willing to answer the question, and there's no point to that either. They'll get that answer when you either respond or don't respond. It's a tactic to make nosiness seem considerate.

He makes an incoherent mumbling sound that is neither an affirmative or a negative response. It's supposed to let the stranger know that she's prying where she's not wanted without being rude, but it goes over here head.

"Can I assume it has something to do with the lady in your life?" she asks. "I've always found that affairs of the heart have the greatest potential to obliterate us."

She is presumptuous, first in that it's a lady that's troubling him, and second that it's a matter of the heart at all. Even so, she's not far from the truth of it. All that's happened is a side effect of his attachment to Scarlett. She started it all with her irrational obsession and ended it by finding that what she believed was true. The rest spirals out from there, weaving and winding and leading here.

"It's everything, really," George says, "but it all tracks back to that."

The waitress give him a sympathetic smile. "Sometimes a genuine and sincere 'I'm sorry' can go a long way. It's a start. There's always time to face the rest later."

George nods, even though her advice is nowhere in the realm of helpful. He pays his bill and leaves her a generous tip. Then he leaves before she can provide him with anymore useless, cliched wisdom.

0o0

Somehow, he still ends up calling Scarlett from a payphone around the corner—an unbelievable occurrence made even more so by the fact that there is actually a real, functional payphone available for his use. She doesn't answer, he reaches her voice mail box. He listens to the recorded message and remains silent on the line even after the beep. He hangs up before he can say anything.

He never should have called in the first place, but the waitress had stirred up nostalgic memories. For the first time since Paris, the memories are more good than bad. All the bad is still there, still terrible, but it's not the first thing the thought of her brings up. For a moment, all he saw was her face and it made him want to hear her voice.

Calling her is a stupid mistake, but he can't take it back. He hopes she won't know it was him, but he knows she will. He's given her the means to start tracking him down. And if she wants to, she will find him. She's never let anything stand in her way before, and she won't start now. His only chance is to get a head start.

He starts driving and doesn't stop for two days.

0o0

Scarlett finds him in a bell tower a week later. It's not a historical landmark and it doesn't need any fixing—not that he would trust himself to pick up the required tools even if it did. It's a matter of old habits. In places like this, he is briefly comforted by familiarity and the knowledge of exactly how everything around him works. She doesn't announce herself, but he senses her presence almost immediately. His first instinct is still to run, but he has nothing left, not a single drop of energy to keep him going. He is every kind of exhausted there is. He's done. He's not sure he could even find the strength to stand up, let along get a step out the door.

He has no choice but to face her.

All this time, he's been an inch ahead of an avalanche. Now it's all going to come raining down on him at once. He can't fight it; he'll lose. So, with reluctant acceptance, he surrenders to it.

"Hello, George," Scarlett says as she looks down at him, crouched in the corner.

"Hey," he returns and silence gathers between them.

"is that all you have to say after you ran out on me like you did?" she asks after it becomes clear that he isn't going to launch into any kind of apology.

He levels his gaze at her. It makes enough of a point because she looks slightly guilty. It's the first real look he's gotten of her since her arrival. It shouldn't be a consolation that she looks as much of a mess as he does, but it almost is. He has never seen her look so ragged and worn down. Even when she was up all night fielding clues and searching for leads, she always looked refreshed and full of life. It's funny how a sense of purpose can do that for a person. It makes every hardship a little worthwhile. Now that neither of them have purpose, they're both floundering.

She sits down beside him, folding in her legs and pressing close to his side. Her warmth is jarring as it radiates from her and heats his skin. He was right to miss it; he doesn't want her to be any further away than this now that she's here. He wants to push her away, but he fears if he reaches out, he might end up drawing her close. So he pulls his arms in around himself and keeps his hands to himself.

"You certainly made it difficult for me," she says.

"Not difficult enough apparently," he says.

"Don't be like that, George."

"You shouldn't have come looking for me," he shook his head. "I left for a reason."

"I think you wanted me to find you," she says. "That phone call and this place," she glances around at their surroundings. "You were waiting for me to catch up to you."

"The phone call was a moment of weakness," he says. "It won't happen again."

"You're damn right it won't happen again," she says, "because I'm not letting you out of my sight again. I've lost you twice now and I don't fancy doing so a third time."

"That's not necessarily your choice."

"Yes, of course, you're right," she says. "It's yours as well. And if you really want me to leave, then I will. I'm rather hoping that's not what you want."

"I don't know what I want anymore," he says.

"Can I tell you what I don't want?" she shifts, turning her body toward his. "I don't want to feel the way I felt that morning after ever again. I panicked when I woke up to an empty bed, an empty hotel room. My mind played tricks on me. It conjured up my worst fears. That you weren't there, because you were never there, because I dreamed it, you and I getting out together. Because, maybe, you hadn't gotten out after all, maybe I hadn't saved you, maybe you were still down there, maybe you had died down there like the others. I was frantic, I was out of my mind. Then I found your soiled clothes, with mine, and I knew. You had left, and somehow that hurt worse."

"I'm sorry that you had to go through that," he doesn't look at her, even though she is watching him intensely. "i guess I could have left a note or something."

"But you're not sorry for leaving?"

"No, Scar, I'm not," he replied. "I had to. I couldn't look at you and not relive it. I couldn't handle it, and I knew that was no way for either of us to live."

"What I know is that this life is not worth living without someone there to live it with you," she takes his hands and he lets her, even though he is scared of where the contact will lead. "It's bound to be difficult, I know that too. But there is no one else with whom I want to spend this life. So, if you want to run, let me run with you."

He squeezes her fingers tightly in his. "How do you do it? How do you wake up each day and live?"

"I think of you. Each day is worth living if it brings me closer to you, that's what I've told myself. As long as you breathe, so can I. As long as your heart beats, so can mine. As long as you live, so can I. I'll suffer every bad thought, every horrible experience to have one precious second of good I have with you. We've been through hell. We can either let it destroy us, or let it help us appreciate what we have. I choose to let this strengthen me, but George, I'm weak without you."

He looks up into the eyes of this woman, who he loves more than is healthy. She is still too much good and too much bad wrapped up in one petite frame, but maybe it's better to be able to feel those extremes than this numb purgatory he's enslaved himself to without her. So, he surrenders to her. It's time for him to face the world with a braver heart.

George uses their joined hands to pull her into his arms. She wraps him in her embrace and he signs into her skin. It's only now that they're together that he realizes he has missed her far more than he thought. Every cell is screaming out for her, so he pulls her in as close as he can and he doesn't let go. Eventually, he'll kiss her and it'll be like welcoming himself home, but until then this will get him by. They will carry each other through.

Scarlett presses her lips to his ear. "I had faith in you. I knew we'd find our way back to each other."

George laughs lightly into her hair. "You've always been able to defy the impossible, why would you stop now?"

"For you, nothing would stop me," she says and buries her face in the crook of his neck. "I'd go through it all again if it meant keeping you close to me."

Maybe he's ready to do the same for her. When it comes down to the central question of fight or flight, the answer is simple.

-fin-