Aaron felt slightly guilty snooping through her house, but if what she said was true the powers-that-be could decide at any moment to scrub the project and then anyone in the program would be like the expendable crewman on Star Trek, only there to be killed off.

He found her passport in a drawer in the massive desk in what was supposed to be the formal living room but was little more than cobbled together book shelves and the mammoth desk. He never expected Dr. Shearing to live in a place so disorganized and dilapidated.

Of course, from what she said last night she had thought on more than one occasion of burning the rickety wooden structure to the ground. There was building supplies in the basement and evidence of newly refurbished sections of wall, but whoever had started the work had not made it a priority. It was obvious this place held only bad memories and broken dreams for the doctor. The first thing they needed to do was organize the sale of this house; if Marta wasn't happy here then it would not be a stretch for her to sell and move to another less secluded area. He would have to bring it up when she awoke, but right now his priority was planning her exit strategy.

He set his laptop up on her massive desk and was busy creating another life, a new person, when a sound upstairs caught his attention. He might have thought it was an alarm if it wasn't just after three in the morning. Saving his work, Aaron went upstairs and found her sitting tiredly on the side of the bed with one hand buried in her tangled hair and the other cradling her cell phone to her ear.

"No," she sighs heavily shaking her head, "You didn't interrupt anything I was sleeping."

Aaron moved to lean against the door jam and startled her when he stepped on a creaking floor board. Her eyes, wide and frightened, relaxed when she saw him with his shoulder to the wood. He thought she might have breathed a sigh of relief before shaking herself and returning to her conversation.

"I'm sorry what," she asked, "I didn't hear you." Her body became perfectly still, putting Aaron on alert, and her mouth opened in a perfect 'O' before her eyes skittered away as she listened before coming back to him. "Manila," she brought her trembling hand to her lips and her eyes filled with tears. "Passport…Of course…Next week," her responses were tantalizing and he wished like hell she was using the speaker phone so he could hear both sides of the discussion. "It is a wonderful opportunity, Dr. Hilcott, thank you." She lowered the phone from her ear and muttered belatedly, "Bye," as she flipped her phone closed.

"Doc," he questioned when she just stared at him with her large tear filled eyes. "What?"

"That—that was Dr. Hilcott," she murmured unnecessarily and he could tell her mind was busy with other thoughts. "He was calling to tell me that he will be sending me to manila to oversee the next batch of chem production."

"Is this unusual," he asked, "Do you think this has anything to do with what you overheard at the lab?"

"What," she asked her eyes focusing on him for a moment before she was biting the corner of her thumb. "No, I—I think," she stood up and immediately cried out and sat back down. She forgot about her cut feet.

"Are you okay," he asked kneeling at her feet and inspecting the bandages.

"I'm fine," she muttered.

"You are not fine," he denied, "You are acting strange and I want to know why."

"They are sending me to Manila," she told him distracted, "I will be working with the live cultures…Live virus!"

"You said this isn't unusual," he pushed when she began muttering to herself.

"It isn't," she agreed as she looked at him for the first time since she heard Hilcott tell her she would be going to Manila. "Don't you understand," she asked.

"You are going to Manila," he nodded, "So that you can oversee the next batch of chems and—," it hit him like a bullet between the eyes. "Tell me you can viral off blues."

"I can viral off blues," she agreed and Aaron swept her up into his arms swinging her in a wide arch as he realized for the first time he might be able to slip the reigns. Marta laughed nervously clutching his shoulders.

"You can viral off blues," he breathed as he stopped spinning her about and eased her back onto the bed with a smile. "We have a lot to talk about if we are going to be ready."

"Is a week enough time," she asked as she pushed herself back onto the bed and pushed her hair behind her ears.

"It'll have to be," he nodded, "I made coffee," he added as he headed for the door, "you stay off your feet. I'll be right back."

He couldn't believe it; it seemed too good to be true and yet she seemed to genuinely want to help him. He nearly floated down the spiraling stairs as the idea of being free of chains and free of his natural born limitations buoyed him. He wasn't too proud to admit that he would rather take a bullet to the brain than return to his previous state and it wasn't a stretch to also admit that he would have remained a willing lapdog as long as they held the key to his freedom incased in a little blue pill. It disturbed him to realize that they planned to viral him off both pills but keep him tied to them like a junky, a performing monkey.

Reaching the kitchen he poured two cups of coffee adding milk and sugar to hers and a little sugar to his. She asked last night how he knew the way she took her tea and the long and short of it was that he had watched her. If he admitted this to her she would probably think he was a stalker, but truthfully he had only done it once a couple months ago when she had arrived in the exam room with red-rimmed eyes and splotchy cheeks as if she had been crying. After his full spec work up he had bid her his customary adios and left like normal, but he had doubled back to the laboratory and watched the place until she left for the night. He expected her to go straight home but instead she had made two stops; the first was at a local liquor shop where she bought a case of wine and the second was the mom and pop diner.

The waitress knew who she was and even what she would be ordering, but Dr. Shearing had seemed disconcerted with the familiarity the employees showed and it was obvious she had no clue about who any of them were. Even he had sat within two tables of her and she had not seemed to notice. Then he assumed she was just preoccupied, but after last night he realized that she was the only solid person in a world full of ghostly apparition drifting through it. She seemed unaware of the world outside her lab; so unaware that she did not even recognize him as a part of that world.

He learned a lot that night. He learned she drank her tea with milk and sugar and she had a surprising, for a doctor of any sort, artery-clogging fetish for cheeseburgers and French fries and she only drank alone. Knowing all of this it wasn't a shock to discover that her refrigerator was empty except for a half gallon jug of milk and a Styrofoam box containing half of a week-old cheeseburger and a few shrunken fries that looked on the verge of growing hair. The freezer was bare and the only things in the pantry to eat were boxed toaster pastries. Putting two into the toaster and plugging it into the orange cord running along the shelf over the sink.

Aaron frowned at this because whoever it was that was doing the restoration of her house was either a moron or did not mind risking the good doctor's life by placing a precariously dangling power cord over a sink made of porcelain coated cast iron. In fact, a few things seemed odd about the refurbished areas of the house. Waiting for the toaster to pop-up he went to the basement to take inventory finding a total of five fifteen gallon cans full of kerosene and yet he had only seen three heaters being used in the house. The only fire extinguisher was in the basement. Someone, Peter, the boyfriend Marta mentioned, was preparing to burn the place to the ground.

Going back upstairs he gathered the pastries onto a plate, got a napkin and their coffee taking it up to the second floor. She was still sitting where he left her but she was staring at a spot on the far wall while her fingers worried the corner of her sheet.

"Here you go, Doc." Aaron handed her the plate and then her cup of coffee watching as she sat the plate on her lap and took a sip from the cup.

"You," she sighed and met his eyes over the rim of her mug. "How do you know the way I drink my coffee?" The way she asks he believes she does not expect him to answer; so, he does the exact opposite.

"Two months ago I came in for a check-up," he murmured, "You had been crying."

"I remember," she nodded, her eyes watching him like a hawk.

"I wanted to make sure you were okay," he told her shaking his head. This sounded worse when he said it out loud; in his head it had seemed rational, but now it seemed like the actions of an obsessed predator. "I waited until you left the lab and followed you."

She frowned and her eyes pierced him as she studied his face, "You were in the diner," she nodded, "I thought I was imagining it; seeing you there because—," She shook her head. "Was that the only time?"

"Yes," he murmured almost inaudibly.

"That doesn't explain the coffee," she lifted the cup, her eyes judging him as he stood before her.

"It was a guess, Dr. Shearing," he finally sighed. Keeping his eyes on hers steadily he prayed she would not over react. "You take your tea with milk and sugar there is no way you drink your coffee black."

She dropped her eyes to the cup and after a moment brought it to her lips and took a sip. She avoided looking at him for the next few minutes before she set the plate of pastries and the coffee mug on the bedside table. "Do you know a lot about me," she asked as she brought her knees to her chest and let her eyes flick in his direction.

"Only things I observed," he admitted. From the look in her eyes she wanted the profile and he decided to use this to get a few answers about the way the house is set up. "You live for the lab and the work you do there; outside it you don't really register the people around you. The waitress obviously knew you, had served you before and often enough that she knew the way you drank your coffee and that you would order the same thing. You on the other hand seemed surprised that she knew you and though you hid it well you would not have known her name if it wasn't on her nametag."

Aaron gestured to the house around them, "This house is hauntingly romantic and broken down, disorganized and scattered. You may have purchased it but it isn't a house you would have chosen by yourself. I think that guy you mentioned last night was the driving force behind this beautiful wreck and I bet he is the one that was supposed to be doing the repairs."

"That's what he does," she admitted, "He restores old houses."

"I don't think so," Aaron told her, "If this is what he did he would have taken care of the foundation before he moved you in and the cosmetic fixes to the walls and stairs although making the place more presentable did nothing for the turn of the century wiring and fuses that barely keep lights going. I think they hired him."

"I don't understand," she shook her head, "What are you saying? Who are they?" Her voice was rising steadily as she pushed herself off the bed and despite the pain to her feet stalked up to him.

"There are seventy-five gallons of kerosene in the basement," he informed her baldly. "You have three heaters and I would hazard a guess that each only takes a little less than one gallon and as little as you seem to use them it seems like an excessive amount to have on hand."

"What," she asked and her face looked shell-shocked, "I don't understand."

"Did you buy the kerosene," he asked quietly, tipping her face so that he could see her glistening eyes. "You mentioned last night burning the place down was that your plan?"

"What, no! I never even filled the heaters. Peter—he –He bought them when the leaves started changing. The fireplaces don't work and the coal furnace that replaced the wood burning stoves is older than God." Her voice dropped a couple octaves and he realized she was probably repeating verbatim what this Peter told her. Her eyes were devastated and she was nearly whispering when she muttered, "He couldn't find the parts."

"How did you meet him," Aaron asked.

"On a plane," She looked confused for a moment, but then she shook her head. "I went to visit my sister in Montreal. We sat next to each other on the flight home." Her face blanched and she covered her mouth stepping away from him, gasping, "Oh, god! I think I'm gonna be sick."

She stumbled away from him out into the hallway and Aaron tried to help her but she jerked violently every time he touched her. She fell to her knees in front of the toilet, violently expelling the contents of her stomach. Her feet were bleeding through the bandages and her body was contorting painfully as she cried great heart wrenching sobs and was sick. Aaron gently knelt beside her and gathered her hair away from her face. She didn't flinch away when he soothingly rubbed her back. After she was finished Aaron pulled her back to his chest and closed the cover before flushing the toilet. She would have stood up but he picked her up and sat her on the closed lid.

Wetting a cloth he wiped her face cleaning away the tear tracks and gentle held the cloth to her noise and whispered, "Blow." She did but he wasn't sure if it was his gentleness or the mental anguish that caused her to double over with great racking sobs. He cleaned her face the best he could and offered her a glass of tepid water from the sink after she calmed enough that only hitching breathes remained as evidence that she had been crying.

Aaron did not lead the sort of life that most people did; when he was a child he took care of his mother instead of the other way around. She had been little more than a child when she got pregnant and now he could be honest and admit the only reason she probably kept him around as long as she had was for the welfare check. He could remember waiting up for her until nearly four in the morning watching inappropriate late night television until she stumbled in with the latest of a very long list of one-night stands. He must have been about four or maybe younger because she dumbed him at a state home when he was five. Until then he would make her breakfast do his best as only a child can do to clean her up after her hangover made her sick. He learned early that people only keep you around if you prove you are useful.

Marta was not his mother, but caring for one helped him care for the other. He cannot remember a time that his mother held him as he cried or rubbed his back as he was sick; that type of care just was not in the cards for him. Aaron tipped her face up until he could see her devastated eyes and he offered her a slight smile before scooping her into his arms and heading back into her bedroom.

"Not in there," she whispered brokenly, "I—please."

Aaron looked into the room and realized that she must have shared that room with Peter before he left. It was a testament to his lack of interpersonal skills that Aaron did not realize learning the man she had lived with might have been paid to get close to her would affect her. Sighing, Aaron nodded, "Okay." Turning he carried her downstairs to the raggedy sofa that was shoved against a wall and covered in dustcovers. He started to lower her onto it but she clutched his shirt and he found himself frowning as he instead sat with her in his lap.

"Why would he break things off if they wanted him here," she whispered after long moments of silence.

"I don't know," he sighed. Thinking about the man he played out meeting Marta on a plane and pretending to be a normal man meeting and wooing a beautiful and intelligent woman. He knew without a doubt that it would not have taken him long to believe his own lies. Hell, he was already knee deep into conflicted emotions and he wasn't even lying to her. "Maybe," he paused, tipping her face so that he could meet her shattered eyes. "Maybe he couldn't go through with it."

She scoffed looking away and Aaron realized that Dr. Marta Shearing the self-assured scientist that seemed to always be on her game at the lab lacked confidence in the real world. Turning her back to face him he reassured her. "It is possible to care for a woman like you, Doc. He might have started off with you as a job, but he left when things changed."

"Yeah, well, we were together for a little over three years. He bought the kerosene," she murmured, "and heaters about a week before he left."

Aaron sighed, "I'm sorry, Doc."

"I want out of here," she muttered through clinched teeth, "I hate this house!"

"Soon," Aaron promised.

"Tell me your plan," she murmured turning her face into his shirt. He could feel her tears soaking through the material as he decided how to break the harsh realities to her.

"This isn't just a small operation," he explained, "You can't just walk away without them coming to look for you; Bourne is a prime example." Looking around the room Aaron and dreading the words he would need to say next he shifted so that his legs were stretched out on the stiff fabric of the sofa and slouched down so that his head was resting on the arm of the couch. "You can't run; you don't have the resources or the skill. The only way to put this behind you so that you aren't waiting for the next person to show up and kill you is to—this is so damned hard to say," he muttered.

"Marta Shearing has to be dead," her voice was muffled by his shirt.

"Yes," Aaron sighed heavily as he confirmed her suspicions. "And Marta," he tightened his arms as he lowered the boom, "There are people that care about you that will have to think you're dead. You won't be able to call anyone; anyone you contact becomes a target."

"My sister," she murmured as her tears returned full force.

"I'm sorry," he soothed, dropping his chin to her temple and stroking her back with firm, comforting strokes. They fell asleep like that after her tears had run dry and they had shifted into more comfortable positions with her facing the back of the sofa and tucked back against his body.