Disclaimer: I own nothing but my twisted imagination.

A/N: This fic is not meant to offend anyone or cause some outrageous revolt. It is simply the product of too much time on my hands and too much imagination to help it thrive.

Pairing: Lana Winters/Oliver Thredson. Don't like, don't read, it's as simple as that. Contains mature scenes and sexual situations, but you should expect that anyway since after all, this is American Horror Story right?

American Horror Story: Asylum

Dance with Darkness

"Love is as much of an object as an obsession, everybody wants it everybody seeks it, but few ever achieve it, those who do, will cherish it, be lost in it, and among all, will never...never forget it."

-Curtis Judalet

It all began with the help of the one woman I considered to be the last person to ever become my savior.

Judy Martin.

With the help of her and the Mother Superior, I was finally freed from the horror that is Briarcliff. Free to finally tell my story.

And did I have a hell of a story to tell….

I'll never forget staring hatefully at Oliver Thredson through the yellow cab's window, reveling in being able to flip him off behind the safety of the window just before it pulled away. I had a mind to confront him about the unimaginable terror he committed, but I knew he would be looking for me and would not stop until he had me within his desperate grasp once more. How I wanted – No, deserved my revenge for he'd done to my beloved Wendy. My life would never be the same after what Oliver did to me… What he did to us.

But Oliver was still on the loose and confronting him at his home would be just like walking willingly back into the very belly of the monster's den that I fought so hard to slip out from between his all too cunning fingers. Instead, I decided against my better judgment to just turn in Dr. Thredson's confession to the authorities and sought out to do what should have been done a long time ago: bury the scattered remains of my one true love.

Oliver went to court for a month straight and I don't know if it was the morning sickness of my pregnancy or just the way he had been always able to strike fear into me so easily, but as I sat in that courtroom, watching him watching me, I would find myself plowing through at least a pack of cigarettes a day. I wanted his ass in that electric chair and it would have been an all too perfect triumph if I could have been the one to pull that switch.

But as I've always said, Head Shrinks are the world's biggest hypocrites because the court may as well have thrown the book at my face when to my absolute horror, the system that Oliver had so despised all his life, actually worked out in his favor for the first time in his tortured existence. The way he turned from the Judge's bench to the back of the courtroom, his dark eyes seeking me out within the crowd and gave me a wide smile at the ridiculous irony of his verdict when the Judge cast his sentence. He had been diagnosed with some form of sane psychosis and was sentenced to live out the rest of his days heavily medicated within Briarcliff Manor.

That's right. The same asylum where the crazy kept the sane locked up. The same god damned Briarcliff that I was also on the hunt to pull down until it was nothing but a pile of stolen lives and broken dreams beneath my feet. And I was determined to bury Oliver Thredson among its corrupted rubble.

I went on to write my story, my legend of the horrors that still haunt me as they replay like a wakeful nightmare, following me even into my dreams. But I guess to say I even have dreams would lead you to believe that I was actually getting some sleep.

I tried to move on, tried to pick up the shattered, broken glass that was once a perfect mirror that contained the once perfect image of my life. But no matter how hard I tried to forget, I knew that Briarcliff would never hold him. If Kit, Grace, and I were able to find a way out, surely Oliver would too.

I could always feel his presence watching me just at the edge of the shadows long fingertips stretching to one day snatch me back into their dark, evil abyss. The sensation of him lingering over my shoulder, just drifting on the edges of my peripheral, and always disappearing the moment I would spin around to face the darkness that threatens to consume me until there is nothing left.

The darkness that is Bloody Face….

Of course I would never find him there, but my eyes would always find themselves searching around me no matter where I was or where I went. Almost as if you'd seen the flash of a lightning bolt. You weren't quite sure it was there, but your eyes will always search for it as though you'd seen it all the same.

I kept telling myself that it was over, that Oliver was sitting in some dark cell confined and so hopped up on medication that he wouldn't know if he was coming or going, giving me the promise that he would never be able to hurt me or anyone else ever again. But the lies we tell ourselves just to get over the terrors that plague us, just to get through our day always do more harm than they can possibly ever do any good.

Sometimes I think this is why they always say women have such a strong intuition because I should have known better than to think one could be rid of such evil so easily.

It was a late Wednesday night. I had just walked into my studio apartment after a long day at the publisher's office downtown. I had been working hard to finish my new book, Maniac, and I was exhausted, throwing the mail on the kitchen counter top and kicking off my pink heels as I went. For the first time in a long time, I was actually excited because my book would finally be going public and soon, everyone would know the grim and terrifyingly remarkable truth. They were ready to begin printing within the next few months, but I refused to go in the spotlight right now to support my book. At least not yet, not while this thing that Oliver planted was still growing inside me.

It would simply have to wait because there was still one more part of my story that needed happen to happen before it could be told. In my book, I wrote that this baby died during childbirth and honestly, when the dreaded day comes that I am to give this child up, it wouldn't be any farther from the truth.

At least in my eyes.

I threw my coat down as I made my way into the kitchen, grabbing a glass of water. I scanned over the magazine covers on the counter top that were mixed within today's mail, smiling to myself because I knew that soon, I would be gracing those very same covers in support of the unique story that has all but written itself. Taking my water with me, I moved towards the darkened hallway, unbuttoning the front of my short pink dress that was beginning to fit a little too snug around my growing belly.

My mind was a buzz of everything that was finally coming to be and I couldn't help the smile that kept gracing my face. It used to be something I had been seeing less and less these days. I went into the bedroom, walking slowly over the thick plush white carpet, enjoying the feel of it between my toes. I plopped down on the bed with a heavy sigh to rest my aching feet. I reached down to rub the soreness out of them and a slight frown formed on my lips because I knew that the further this pregnancy pursued, the sooner my feet would no longer be able to bear the wear of my favorite heels. But as if her presence was still with me, I glance up to my nightstand and the frown quickly fades in a moment so quick that it's hard to say it even occurred at all.

The moment I saw her.

My Wendy.

It was the same picture of her in bed, covered only by a thin white sheet that Oliver stole from our home, the same picture that I used to try to bash his face in.

She was framed in a brand new black picture frame, her printing paper riddled with the smallest wrinkles and creases and the tiniest drop of his dried blood in the corner. Battle scars I called them. I once thought it was lost forever, but even through all of this torment, she still found her way back to me. I still remember when the police officer gave it to me as I stood outside Oliver's home the same night the police came to arrest him. How I'd clutched it desperately to my breast when our eyes met as they brought him handcuffed out of the house.

And since then, it's never left my sight.

"Hello Wendy…" I say quietly, wistfully. I find myself smiling softly as I gave into her brown eyes. My fingers trace along the edges of her frame.

"We're almost there. We've almost made it to the big time… And you've been here with me, every step of the way as I knew you always would."

I take another sip of my water and realize that it's now empty and get up one last time for another glass. On my way back, I turn off all the lights, heading into the warm muted glow of my bedroom when something catches my peripheral, but this time I choose to ignore it because deep down, I know that I can't move forward if I'm constantly taking two steps back.

I close my bedroom door and gingerly reach to place my water next to Wendy's picture on the nightstand but drop it completely to the fluffy carpet under my feet, the cold liquid splashing over my bare toes as the old sensation of an unrivaled terror seeps into my skin as if it were an invisible poison. The frame is still there, but Wendy's picture…

Gone.

I spin around my bedroom, my eyes searching frantically, the blood in my veins roaring through my ears as my eyes slowly drift back to the door. I stay quiet, listening. But after a long moment, I hear nothing and carefully, cautiously make my way back to the door. I reach for the doorknob, my fingers squeezing the cold round metal for support as I snatch it open only to find myself staring into the blackened hallway past the frame of my bedroom door. I peer out into the darkness, unmoving in hopes that what I've been running from all this time isn't there, but to my horror, the darkness is leering right back.

Watching.

Waiting.

And it never disappoints.

"Hello Lana…." came the deep smooth baritone of the only voice that could seep down deep to chill me to the very core of my already shattered soul. "Did I ever tell you how nice it always is to have you here… So close to me again?"

To be continued….