Nothing but Lies, XXI

Summary: xxi. Here and Now. And she knows it is the truth, simple and unshakable. Final chapter.

A/N: This is the last chapter – the epilogue – of NbL. I apologize for

- stupid errors in time and space

- my non-existent knowledge or wild make-ups of New York geography, American actors, American presidents, American history, information technology and the laws of Physics

- randomness and non-progress of the story and for

- sudden changes in point of views, style, universes, structure and tenses!

At the same time thanks goes, again and forever, to Misery's Toll and all the people who peeked in to review from time to time. Without you, I'd have stopped after ten chapters instead of going AU. Thank you for giving me the chance to finish this, for encouragement, praise and criticism, for new ideas and for your patience.

Maybe I'll meet you all again somewhere.

Sunlight falls onto her bare arms.

Olivia tilts back her head and takes in the warmth of the sun. It isn't summer yet, even if spring is slowly fading. But nights are steadily growing warmer and the sun at midday is warm and golden. People hurry down the streets, talking, laughing, walking, and the image is so normal she feels like wanting to burst out laughing in sheer joy.

We are back.

Eighteen months have passed since their strange encounter with the being they called the device. Much more time has flown by since she returned from Over There, even more since she travelled thereto bring Peter back. So many hours, days, weeks, months and years since she lost John and Charlie. So little time since she found them again. She knows they are alive, somewhere, somehow, each one in his own universe. Each one living on, dreaming on. And there are so many universes, so many dreams, so many wishes. The sheer number of opportunities still astounds her beyond belief.

She watches three children speed across the lawns of the park which spread out in front of her and can't help but smile. Pearls of laughter reach her ear, touch a string in her heart. Since their world was healed there is a pain in her chest that will never leave. It has become a part of her, just like so many other things have changed her, made her grow, shaped her. So many things and so many people made her the person she is today. William Bell is dead. Nina Sharpe is dead and her Charlie and her John. In another world, a mother still mourns the loss of her only son. In the same universe, children grow up with the person that is their father and yet is not. Olivia remembers Phillip Broyles. She sees his concerned face and his warm, dark eyes in front of her. She remembers both Phillip Broyles: two people, the same and yet so different and the same, again, in a way that is entirely inexplicable and yet the easiest answer in the universe. Her heart reaches out, like so often, trying to cross the expanse of time and reality. Be happy. Thank you. Farewell.

Until we meet again.

Underneath her naked feet, the grass is cool and moist. On a whim she has taken off her shoes, has pulled off her stockings and now buries her feet in cool, green grass. Why they have given her Fringe Department as Special Agent in Charge one year ago is beyond her. There hasn't been a Fringe event since the end. The world is normal once again, back to its daily routine that once seemed so far away. They aren't needed any more: years will pass, decades, even centuries if she can believe what Peter was told by the machine itself. A long time will pass until their world will start to gravitate towards its siblings again, until the multitude of possibilities shrinks to one and realities start to merge. Many years will pass until people will have to search for a gate again, for a solution, for a way to overcome the veils between universes in order to call upon an ancient being living in the heart of a mechanical device. Maybe, then, there will be another way. Maybe war will be out of question by then. Maybe, in the future, someone will find an ancient file, written by someone named Fringe Division, typed up neatly on a yellowish and stained piece of paper bearing the signature of a Federal Bureau long closed down. Maybe it will contain a prophesy on the end of the world and the destruction of mankind. Maybe a woman will lose a loved one and start having dreams. Maybe she will set out to find answers first and a way to save her world later. Maybe she will meet a weird scientist, a loyal colleague and a serious superior, a cheery assistant and a lost man and together they will be able to save their world. Maybe, maybe…

Maybe is just another excuse humans use in order to justify their ways of life. If she has learned something it is the following:

Live every day.

Just live.

Olivia has never lied to herself. She might have thought so, might have believed what she repeated to herself during those far-gone, dark and cold days was not the truth. Some people find comfort in knowing they are able to lie. She found it in the strength of a lie that wasn't one, not at any moment in her life. If someone says I lie, and this in itself is the truth, does he always lie? Or is it just a twisted, confusing view on life? Underneath the warm sheets of a bed shared with John, in the cold waters of Walter's sensory deprivation tank, on the leathery upholstery of her own couch. During those white and black days of searching and re-living, on her journey through the universes, in the dim light of Peter's Over There apartment, on the icy stone floor of her prison cell and its hopelessness, to another level of pain and desperation upon her return, Olivia has learned what lies are. She has seen their selfish sides and what people call white lies. She has seen lies heal people and destroy them, has seen lies turn to truth and to despair. Lies have held her when she threatened to fall and have caused her as much pain as the truth has. And in the midst of everything she has learned that there is no lie and no truth, no distinction in between them. There only is one thing that matters and it is the way one chooses to live one's life.

Olivia chooses here.

A soft wind stirs up the soft, green leaves of the trees around her. It plays in her hair, whisking blond strands into her face which tickle her cheeks. She pushes them away with one hand. She keeps her hair short, just long enough to be able to tuck it away behind her ears. The soft feeling of it has become familiar and light. The first time she cut her hair had been to distinguish herself from whom she had been and whom she had become. It was punishment and relief at the same time and every time she caught Peter looking at her from the corners of his eyes she didn't know whether to cry or to rage. And even now, knowing his expression as well as her own and having understood what it is, she still hasn't gotten used to the wonder she sees whenever she catches him looking at her. It doesn't scare her anymore. Instead, she feels… contentment. He can still look right through her, right past every mask she tries on, and still marvels at her as if she was a precious piece of art that never changes and yet looks different every day. She can see it in him, too, the way he shifts like a landscape on the bottom of the sea watched from above. His expression, his eyes, his voice – she still learns to listen, to see, because there are so many nuances to him she feels like she doesn't know him at all even after years. Sometimes even his touch feels different and she shivers whenever his fingers run over her bare skin. Every touch, every lingering gaze and every smile tells her: He'll never, ever again mistake her for someone she isn't, the same way he'll never again mistake someone for being her.

And she knows it is the truth, simple and unshakable.

Olivia slips on her shoes again without bothering to put on her socks and slowly starts walking. The sun is losing strength as the shadows grow longer. She passes a playground full of children and parents, benches with old people sitting and enjoying the first summer's sun. Shouts and laughter come from everywhere.

Sometimes, they still wonder. What is it – this being, this consciousness living in a shell of cables, steel and circuitry? Walter calls it the device, Peter named it the child. Astrid, whose scientific nature cannot help but wonder, invents different names for it with each day they discuss the topic. Olivia has settled on a simple one she uses only for herself: creator. The name isn't supposed to refer to a higher deity or even God. But brought up as a Christian and raised in the realms of Science, she cultivates her own belief. What else is there if there isn't something, something more than anything? Every human being is a creator itself. The consciousness inside the machine was only a part of a huge entity, some small part of a being that lived in different worlds, times and universes and called out to its parts. Maybe, she sometimes thinks, maybe it was this. Maybe the tiny parts of the creator's soul were lonely and called out, gravitated towards each other unconsciously and thus almost brought forth their own death. But then, there it is again, the obligatory maybe she has come to realize is the biggest mystery of all.

They still try to solve it.

Sometimes, when there's not much to do, when Walter isn't occupied with his business, when Astrid finishes with her tasks as Olivia's assistant early and manages to maneuver her superior to the huge building that houses Massive Dynamics. They try on days when Peter comes home from the MIT early, a huge grin on his face that tells the world he just bested some students by expanding their horizon so far they didn't even remember to ask questions when he was finished with them. Together, they sit and discuss and analyze what has happened, and how, and why, and between the four of them they spin hypothesis and develop theories. But the fact remains that what happened to them has passed the world almost forgotten. Of course the people remember the day the world almost collapsed, the war and the dead and the fear. But ask them about districts encased in amber and you'd receive a confused stare and a shake of the head. And it's not like they have time every day. Since there is so little for Fringe Division to do Olivia works for other departments, and Astrid, as her assistant, follows wherever she goes. Walter has a whole bunch of scientists at his disposal and Astrid left him in the capable hands of the girl Alexandra Peter had trained so well. And Peter teaches Theoretical Physics and Relativity at the MIT, astounding both students and professors.

The weather's nice. On Sunday, she will take Rachel and Ella out, she decides. The girl enjoys their weekends together, especially her time with Peter. Olivia loves those days, too, when the people she considers her family are with her. Lately, it seems as if Rachel has met someone new. Ella has already spent a few evenings with Olivia and Peter. She takes a second to close her eyes. She wishes for her sister's happiness with her whole heart. When she opens them again, the world's brightness blinds her as it always does when she forgets to shield her eyes. It takes a few seconds to get used to the light again, like every time.

Nowadays, it is stronger than ever.

One of the things not even Walter can explain is the fact that her sight hasn't left her when the curtains fell, that her ability to see through the veil still is with her. The world is alight in colors. For the briefest of seconds universes have merged, being drawn together and torn apart in the blink of an eye that lasted forever. Her reality has been touched by Over There. It has ceased to be a single being and has become more. How much more even Olivia cannot tell. What she knows is that every person has a different color, shines in a glimmer uniquely his own. Sometimes she is afraid of looking into the mirror because she, too, has it. All around her the universe sports the proof that it has transcended its own self and grown, has crossed borders of reason and has become more. Worlds have touched and nothing will ever be the same again. Plants, people, even buildings, shine in the light of their otherworldliness and sometimes the reflection is too bright for her. She averts her eyes, then, but only for a few seconds. Days seem brilliant and warm gold and nights are all pale silver, cool white and dark black. The world is beautiful in its own way. Wary, yes, and old, and suffering. But there is a beauty to it she never really noticed until the moment she learned to see. Until the moment she accepted who she was. Gate? Keeper? Traveler? Seeker? Outcast?

Olivia.

A bird is sitting on the branches of a low bush, facing away from her. The woman slows her step to watch the tiny creature flutter and pick at its plumage. It flutters away quickly when her mobile rings.

"Dunham."

"Olivia." Peter forms her name like other people form the name of precious jewels. She smiles.

"Yes."

"Walter just called. He decided he wants a barbecue tonight."

"A barbecue. It's not even summer."

A deep chuckle follows her incredulous statement.

"Yeah. He claims as soon as the sun is out for more than ten hours a day it is summer by definition."

"Sounds like him."

They both share a brief moment of silence. She knows he can feel her smile, the same way she can feel his warmth. "So what should I bring?"

"Would you mind running by the store to get some meat and bread?" Peter asks, his voice full of amusement. "I'll pick up some drinks and corn on the cobs. When will you be back?"

She runs over the next appointment in her head quickly.

"Half past eight."

"Fine. I'll organize a barbecue and all the stuff. I'll see you then?"

Half a statement, half a question. Enough to have her heart beating wildly in her chest, looking forward to seeing him again.

"Hey – can Ella and Rachel come?"

"Of course. I'll call them and pick them up."

"Thanks, Peter."

"You're welcome."

Olivia holds her breath and listens intently. She can hear him breathing at the other end of the line. She can see him, too: the expression on his face, the color of his eyes, the smirk on his lips. She can feel his heartbeat, a sound even more familiar to her now than her own. In front of her, a group of teenagers pass by, chatting away enthusiastically, looking for a place to sit. The words rise inside her, plead to be released, sing in her mind until she caves and breathes in deeply.

"Peter?"

"Yeah?"

As always, the words exit her with the heavy feeling of rightness. The truth, honest and unshakable, and she knows Peter knows they are. On those words, her new world has been built. Everything she has, everything she is springs from them, which have been given to her as a gift so she can share them again. Every lie there ever was withers, changes shape and turns to vivid, bright colors.

Here she is.

"I love you."