entrancelogs | + Guilt Runs Deep

The first time the scene opens up Barbie has no idea what is going on for a moment. He has nightmares all the time of this, of his unit opening fire on another unit, thinking they're insurgents and ending up slaughtering all but one member of another unit from the United States Army that was there doing their job just as his unit is. The first time he marvels for a moment at how real his rifle feels, the memory of the heat, the sun beating down on them so intense and so real. The first time he falls for it, his own guilt making him relive this moment often enough that it's not surprising, not in the least.

Then it restarts just as his commanding officer is realizing what has happened, just as the lone survivor of the other unit is captured by the actual insurgents in the region.

"What the fuck?!"

And that's when he realizing what's going on, and Wonderland has struck again.

"NO! CEASE FIRE! LOWER YOUR WEAPONS!"

Despite his screaming, despite Barbie trying to stop his unit, it happens again, and everyone before them dies but one single woman taken hostage before they can save her.

Even though he knows it's fruitless, he tries over and over again to stop the killing, to save those that signed up to protect others from dying at the hands of a special forces unit that had thought they were doing the same.

There are times when bullets hit Barbie that hadn't when he had been there. It doesn't stop him though from raising his rifle, from knowing that his bullets take lives that he's meant to be helping. Even with his eyes closed tight, or screaming for everyone to hold their fire, he still raises his rifle and fires.

No matter that he practically screams himself hoarse, that he's sobbing and can't see those that he had targeted when it had truly happened in the Afghanistan desert.

Although he had told her about this, seeing it happen makes Julia sick to her stomach. She watches the first couple of times, safely away from the bullets and shouting. Once Barbie begins to break down, however, she can't hold it back anymore, and she runs to him. Grabbing him by the shoulders, she forces him to look at her, doing her best to stay calm in the chaos.

"Barbie! Barbie, look at me."

He fights it, pain twisting up his features as he fights not to pull the trigger, knowing who he's killing. Shaking his head, trying to keep his finger off the trigger. The gun still fires, the bullets still fly, killing his fellow soldiers.

He jerks at that sound, at a touch that hadn't been there before. At the sight of someone that hadn't been there, shouldn't be there.

"Julia! Oh God! You have to get out of here," he says, even as he grabs her arm, jerking her down. "Get down. Get out of the line of fire."

Julia tries to wriggle out of his grasp as he jerks her down, her arm aching from the action but she isn't angry with him.

"This isn't real," she argues. "Barbie, listen to me. We're in Wonderland. Whatever is happening right now it's real, it's a memory that Wonderland is making you relive."

She still isn't entirely sure why, but that much is true. Julia doesn't have a plan beyond getting Barbie out of his own head, but once she does, she knows she's going to have to come up with something fast if she wants to get him out of there.

"It's..." He knows it's not real and at the same time he knows it is one of the most really things in his life. This moment changed so much for him, even if he isn't sure he always talks about how much it changed him, changed his life in his mind. But this is as real to him as the dome and meeting Julia. Moments that changed his life. Changed who he was as a person.

"We kill them all," he says. "We couldn't see," he adds, almost pleading with her. "We had know way or knowing who they were."

Needing her to see the truth, to see what he'd been through and that he wasn't a man that could have done this if he'd known.

"I know," she tells him, forcing her voice to sound confident, commanding. One of them has to be, or she won't be able to pull him out of this.

"I know it was an accident, babe. I know the kind of man you are. You would never do this on purpose."

He goes still, silent for a long moment, staring at her. "You... You really have faith in me?" He is utterly stunned by that, unable to find words in that moment, just staring at him.

"You believe me."

Somewhere deep down, he's never believed anyone would truly believe him about what happened that day. His guilt isn't over what happened, but that he wouldn't be believed. Yet Julia believes him.

"Julia."

He says her name softly, and then a moment later he is grabbing her, clutching her to him.

Julia throws her arms around him, dragging him close to her and keeping a firm hold on him, her fingers running through his hair gently, a complete contradiction of how fiercely she holds him to her.

"Of course I believe you, babe. Of course I do."

She's isn't lying. She would never lie to him - not again, not after everything they've been through. And she knows, for all of their faults or their sins, he wouldn't lie to her, either.

"I'm right here, Barbie," she murmurs, pulling away from him and cupping his cheeks with her hands so she can look him in the eye. "And I'm not going anywhere without you."

He hates that he's sobbing here, but no one but Julia is noticing him. No one but Julia is aware that things have changed and he's glad for that as he holds her crushingly tight to her, burying his face against her neck.

"We didn't know! We couldn't see them, and we were told..." And none of that matters though. They killed an entire unit, and in the end they were glorified for it. There was no telling the truth once the unit made a choice, just living with honor for the dishonorable.

Shifting, meeting her gaze as she pulls back, fearing for the worst as he stares at her. "Please don't. I need you Julia. I know you know I love you, but I need you, Julia."

"I know," she tells him, stroking his cheeks gently with her thumbs. Everything that has happened the last few months--Wonderland's games, all their conflicts, all her conflicting emotions--none of them seem important now. All that matters is that she's there, with him.

"Listen, we need to get you out of here. But you have to let this go, Barbie. You have to forgive yourself for what happened." It sounds like an impossible task, and it might nearly be. But there isn't any other option, because she's not leaving without him. "You have to let go of your past so we can have a future together."

"How?" And he winces as he says it, showing perhaps just how much time and thought he puts into this moment, into what he had been part of and done. Much as he can make the excuses, he isn't excusing himself or his unit.

Though her words, they cut through a lot. He hasn't let this go because he has no reason to. He hasn't had one. Not until now.

He isn't the same man that had been with that unit. Not the same man that worked for Max. He's changed, kept changing, pushed forward to be someone else, someone that wasn't part of all of that. In a couple of weeks under the dome, and now in the months he's spent in Wonderland.

"You've seen it all, Julia. You know my worst." And he needs her to know that. This, his guilt and pain from this moment, is the last he's kept from her, and he needs her to know this is all of it.

"And you know my worst. And we still love each other. That's what matters."

She tries to push back her tears, forcing herself to be strong for him, but it's a nearly impossible task. Julia has been the one fighting this lately, questioning everything and wondering if they are truly meant to be together. But she knows they are. They wouldn't have made it this long, with all they have been through, if they weren't.

"Maybe that's what all of this is about. I've forgiven myself for the things I've done. It's time that you do, too."

He fairly slumps against her, clinging to her and holding her tight to him. Desperate, panicked, feeling as if he's in parts and pieces and they're all laid out. Admitting to what he's done is one thing, but knowing Julia has seen it is another.

And she still loves him. Despite it all, she loves him. Even at his worst.

"I love you," he manages, choking on tears he can't stop. "I..." She's seen the worst, and she can still love him. She knows it all... and she is saving him. It's like a wrenching inside of him, painful, tearing through him, and it leaves behind a sensation. One he doesn't understand but he can guess what it is. "Let's... Please, let's go."

Julia nods. She knows what happened, and lets out a breath of relief. Both she and Barbie had clung to so much over the last year in Wonderland - her role as the Monarch, the kids, the Dome, and their own personal sins. With every event it seemed like Wonderland challenged them more and more, worked to make their lives harder than they needed to be.

But, in a way, maybe it was also Wonderland that is forcing them to let go of who they were before so they could move on. Together.

"Come on, babe," she whispers, pulling him along with her, away from his personal Hell. "It's okay. You're going to be okay."

+ Guilt Runs Deep

Barbie | ota | cw for mass murder, bullet wounds, war zone

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