Hi there Sleepy Hollow fandom!

I come bearing my first attempt at Ichabbie.

Enjoy, and as per usual in my sad and lonely ficcing world, I don't own the thing this thing is based off of.

Review if you like!

Her nails dug into something hard.

The sounds of scratching met her ears, eerie and distant, and then the quiet huff of someone breathing. It was a steady sound, calming…

It grew more and more faint, while the scratching grew louder.

A pain seeped into her fingers. Was it she that caused it? The smell of smoke and sulfur assaulted her nose and she felt her throat burn as she inhaled. Blackness met her eyes.

A fire blazed somewhere near her and she couldn't see it, couldn't pinpoint the location from where she-

Abbie whipped around, suddenly aware of being on her feet. An abyss, black and unending, met her gaze no matter where she let it stray. The mindless scratching sounded just outside her ears, loud, growing frantic…

She coughed. Opened her mouth to call out for….

Someone.

Anyone.

Nothing came. Not a shout, not a squeak.

Not a whisper for help escaped her mouth.

She froze.

The sound of flames in the distant dark blazed with fury. And yet she was cold. So cold. So cold it hurt.

So cold it burned.

She raised a hand to her face.

Couldn't see it.

Couldn't see the source of the fire, or the creature that was making that godawful clawing noise. Wherever she was, it was made of nothingness.

And she was completely alone.

She breathed.

Cold air hit her lungs and she practically hacked in response to it. Her heart slammed into her ears like a train, fear rushing into her blood as she reached up to her neck and tried to squeeze a voice out of it.

Good God,

Is this what it's like to go insane?

And maybe she was. Abbie stood in the middle of a cold, dead world of nothing and strangled herself, and the tears began trickling hot hot hot against the ice cold skin of her cheeks.

Maybe she was insane.

Maybe this whole thing was just her, her mind, fabricating an elaborate false reality in which she and a complete stranger were pawns and players in a game of gods and demons. Maybe she created it all, and none of it was real, and she was actually lying strapped to a bed in the psyche hospital.

Maybe she was there instead of Jenny.

Maybe she was Jenny.

And she was falling now, her world crumbling into fire and ice as her brain fizzled out and her delusion darkened into death.

Maybe she was dying.

Maybe she was dead.

Her nails dug into the flesh of her throat. She dropped, knees landing hard on…

On nothing.

But it hurt.

Everything everywhere hurt, and she couldn't even scream out the pain.

'Belief is sanity', he had told her.

He was wrong, God, he was wrong…

She had just started to believe.

Abbie bent her back and stared upward, the scratching of the monster in her head echoing over the fires of Hell. She dug in.

Ripped.

Shivered as blood poured down her chest and she closed her eyes and laughed.

"Shhh, Leftenant, easy…"

Abbie jerked, eyes splitting open to the blurry forms of her fingers, sliding off the wood of a table. Her nails stung, fingers ached.

She was moving.

A groan of confusion and frustration ground out of her chest, and to her ears it sounded absolutely pathetic. Any other day, any other moment, she would have cared.

She felt her muscles refuse to respond as Ichabod lifted her from the chair and hefted her up against his chest. Arms hanging loosely and lazily, Abbie was a ragdoll, and Crane was carrying her limp body to the nearby bed.

She squinted at it as he leaned in, the fuzziness of her vision fighting to clear.

And then, softeness.

She heard him grunt slightly as he set her down onto the mattress, and the warmth of his body disappeared. She frowned at the feeling of loss it caused.

Straining she turned her head against the pillow, found him kneeling beside the bed to gaze warily at her. His lips drew tight and his eyes narrowed, thick brows creasing inward.

He worried.

She forced a dry smile at him.

"Just a nightmare, Crane."

As her sight focused she could see him sigh, shake his head slowly.

"More like torment, Miss Mills. A torment I never wish to see you suffer again."

A pause, and she knew what they were both thinking.

She said it for him,

"You will. We both will. We still have a long way to go…."

Seven years.

Seven.

The thread of fear slithered under her skin again, sinking into her veins and making her hiccup softly against a sudden, irrational onslaught of tears. It was all too much, too much already.

Too much pain.

Too much fear.

Too much she didn't understand and wasn't ready for and-

She wasn't strong enough, not alone….

His fingers slid across the quilt, nudging against her own and studying the bruised tips of her nails. She ignored the sting, pretended his fretting didn't hurt.

"I feel like I'm going nuts, Crane. And we're not even six months into this."

He nodded.

"I fear sanity will be something we will have to fight long and hard to maintain throughout our tribulations, Leftenant,"

His large hand covered hers, blunt calluses brushing against the skin,

"But I promise I will be here to keep you from losing yourself. And you will do the same for me, yes?"

He smiled, an attempt to seem hopeful. The softness of his gaze, the steady rise and fall of his chest, the slight huff as he breathed so close to her face…

Her own manic laugh echoed in her ears and she smiled back.

Squeezed his hand.

"Sure."