A/N: I'm Baaaaaack! Sorry to have kept you guys waiting for so long, I got caught up in the demands of Grad Psych school. I'll try to update more frequently now that things have calmed down somewhat, I promise. On another note, a giant thanks to those who have read and reviewed my work. Keep 'em coming guys!

If a dozen members of a SWAT team had had their rifles trained on her Nina could not have been more terrified. She stood rooted to the spot, hands still clutching her abdomen, seconds before seemingly awash in a crimson nightmare, now only displaying smooth, pale skin and the familiar ridge of scar tissue. She drew in a deep breath and held it, repeating a deep-breathing exercise she had been taught by her therapist that supposedly helped to calm rattled nerves, but this time she felt her chest tighten and her throat constrict. The long exhale that should have followed erupted instead in a ragged sob, and she sank to the floor, hugging her knees to her chest, convulsions wracking her body.

The insistent ringing of the doorbell finally penetrated her consciousness, and Nina forced herself up, palming away the tears that ran down her face. Grabbing the blouse and pulling it on, she went to answer the door, and to her shock was met by a courier from the sushi restaurant. Of course. In her panic, Nina had completely forgotten the fact that she'd ordered dinner.

"Did you order sushi, miss?" He asked, seemingly oblivious to the panic racing through his customer's veins. Nina forced a smile in response; one that she was sure didn't reach her eyes.

"Yes, thanks," Nina said, shoving the twenty dollar bill she'd set aside into his hands, and barely listened as he itemized the receipt. "Keep the change," She mumbled, shutting the door as he stammered his thanks.

A few minutes later Nina sat at her kitchen table, grimly forcing slices of shrimp nigiri down her throat, barely tasting them. She'd calmed down somewhat, or at least the utter panic she'd felt minutes before had subsided enough for her to think with a measure of clarity. The hallucinations were escalating again, that much was obvious to Nina, becoming increasingly violent as Thomas steadily ratcheted up the pressure upon her to deliver the perfect performance he all but demanded. Well, she'd done it once, and strangely enough, Nina thought, it had been the very hallucinations that had driven her to the brink of madness that had helped her to tap into the emotional resources she'd needed to dance the Odile variation. Of course, they'd also driven her to commit an act that had nearly killed her, so the fact that she'd given the performance of a lifetime was ultimately cold comfort. Nina sighed, raking her fingers through her hair, fighting the almost overwhelming urge to rip it out in frustration. She wanted to scream out; she had spent nearly every waking moment since the premiere trying to put the pieces of her fractured mind back together again, and for all the effort, she was really no closer to laying her demons to rest than she'd been when she'd regained consciousness in the hospital all those weeks ago. Nina dropped her head and drew her knees up to her chest, allowing herself to give in to the suffocating fear that threatened to consume her. But then again, Nina thought, in a burst of startling clarity, that was what she had been doing all along, wasn't it? Ever since the hallucinations had started, she had ignored them, run away, screamed in terror, done anything but actually face them, face herself. Perhaps it was time she started. Perhaps it was time to fight back.

"Sounds to me like a pretty terrifying experience," Lauren Isles said grimly after Nina had related to her this latest hallucination. Nina nodded, numbly.

"The last few- the ones of myself dressed as Odile, they've frightened me, but I knew that what I was seeing wasn't real. This one….." Nina trailed off.

"You couldn't distinguish as being a hallucination. With the others, at least you could identify them as hallucinations. This one you couldn't, which meant that it scared you that much more," Lauren offered. Nina nodded numbly.

"I just wish I knew what to do about it," Nina whispered. "I can't go on like this anymore. I'm losing weight- the last time I looked in the mirror I swear I almost didn't recognize my own face. I haven't slept well in months."

Lauren tilted her head somewhat, and Nina felt herself growing uncomfortable under her scrutiny.

"You know," Lauren said slowly, "I can hear how scared you are. You went through some pretty awful crap a few weeks ago, and you're going through it again right now."

Nina nodded miserably. "It's getting worse," she whispered. "I damn near had a mental breakdown a few weeks ago. Half the time I couldn't tell if what I was seeing was real or if it was all in my head. I'm getting to that point again."

Lauren nodded. "You feel like you're headed right back to where you were, does that about cover things?" She asked. Nina's throat closed, and she could do nothing but nod in response. Lauren quickly handed her a tissue and sat back in her chair, drawing in a long breath and blowing it out in a sigh. "Tell me something," she continued. Nina again nodded. "We've kind of established that you're pretty darn terrified of some of your, shall we say, more aggressive impulses. Why is that?"

Nina looked up almost in shock. Was it not obvious? "I've hurt people, Dr. Isles!" She snapped.
"I almost killed myself!"

Lauren's gaze was steady, letting Nina know in no uncertain terms that she wasn't the least bit phased by her outburst. "I can appreciate that," she said. "The thing is, Nina, you're not the only one with those feelings. Everyone has them, it's just a part of being human. Freud called it the Id," she said.

Nina had never heard the term before. "Id?" she asked.

Lauren shrugged. "The easiest way to think of it is like an iceberg. You know how ninety percent of an iceberg is actually below the water?" She asked. Nina nodded. "Well, our mental life isn't a whole lot different. What we're aware of is only a small part of what's actually going on inside of us. The good news is that we can become more and more aware of what's happening below the waterline, so to speak. And once we are, we can make better choices. The problem is that it's usually a pretty frightening process, and some folks just aren't up to it. So they run from it instead, and the more they run, the more control it has over them."

Nina was by now utterly lost. "I get the analogy, kind of," she said. "But what has it got to do with anything?" She asked.

"I was hoping you'd ask," Laruen smiled. "My point is that you're scared of what's below the waterline, the Odile part of yourself. You're not exactly kind to her."

Small tumblers of a puzzle began to click into place for Nina. "So the kinder I am to her, the more I can accept her, the less she'll need to get my attention through bizarre hallucinations," Nina finished.

Lauren's smile widened. "Bingo," She said.