Just days after fighting Daisy's fiance to the death, Cyd and Shelby could still barely breathe a sigh of relief. The tension had been high trying to keep Daisy safe in case of a time rift opening up, not that one had ever opened in Barry's lab, but to be safe the girls had insisted that Daisy stay with them until they could figure it out.
"Now that we suspect that Barry likes you," Shelby begins to Daisy with a smug smile, feeling over the moon happiness to see her friends happy.
"I don't 'like' Daisy." Barry corrects her, breaking into the conversation in annoyance.
"Shelby clearly meant 'Love'." Cyd jumps in, a look a satisfaction painted on her face as she sees the horror on Barry's face.
Daisy nervously twiddled her thumbs underneath the table, her clammy hands shaking anxiously beneath her blouse. She felt her stomach churn as she heard talk of Sebastian, an almost nauseous feeling burning her throat. Truth be told she knew deep inside that this situation could only be worsened if Cyd, Shelby, Naldo, and Barry found out of her little white lie, plaguing her conscience with guilt.
Weeks following, she knew her secret couldn't be held safe, no matter how much she had grown to trust her twenty-first century friends. She knew that in the blink of an eye she could be gone and they could do nothing about it to bring her back as far as she knew. The thought of Sebastian scared her, the rage, the deep voice of putrid hate, and jealousy that it hadn't been him she had loved. Until of course, telling Cyd and Shelby became inevitable and her only plausible solution for a chance of happiness and freedom.
"Good morning Daisy!" Shelby exclaims as Daisy wearily trudged to the kitchen counter, Shelby's purple robe tied snugly around her small frame.
Daisy felt as if her gag reflex was immediately triggered upon being surrounded by the familiar scent of home sitting before her on the countertop. But as homesick as she was, and as happy as she was to have a taste of home, she wanted nothing more to toss up whatever had been left over from last night's newest favorite food, pepperoni pizza.
"What's wrong Daisy?" She hears Shelby voice with concern, drawing attention from a tired Cyd as well.
"I'm really appreciative of you trying to make me feel at home, but even my cooks couldn't do that to a goat. " Daisy buries her nose in the robe, hearing Cyd laugh from beside her.
Daisy continued to poke and pry at the steaming meat, Shelby and Cyd watching as she turned green, waves of nausea apparent as they ran through her body, and the look of guilt heavy on her weary brown eyes. Cyd and Shelby looked at each other before sitting on either side of Daisy on the kitchen stools, turning their bodies to face the troubled looking brunette.
"Daisy, we've seemed to notice that ever since we fought Sebastian that you haven't been yourself. Is it possible that you regret your decision to have ended your engagement?" Shelby coaxes, rubbing a gentle hand on her back.
"Of course not, Barry is a noble guy!" She insists, looking to Cyd as she hears her snicker.
Daisy twiddles the lace on her dress, wrapping it loosely around her pointer finger the wiggling it out of the loop, repeating as she looked to avoid any further confrontation.
"Well, we can take you to talk to him if you'd like. Would you want us to take you to talk to hi…"
"No!" Daisy exclaims completely out of character, before clapping her hands over her mouth in embarrassment.
It was then that she scurried from her chair, climbing quickly yet effortlessly up the staircase. Cyd and Shelby knew that something was off, that somehow fighting Sebastian affected the future somehow. Or maybe it was just homesickness and guilt, or fear of going back to her time and having to confront Sebastian. No matter what it was, they knew that they had to help Daisy and rescue her from her brutal times.
"Well, I can't guarantee that I can help you, but I'm sure we'll find a way to help Daisy tell the truth." Barry reassures the girls, as they struggle to relax on the couch in his lab.
"Don't you have like a truth serum or something?" Cyd mocks him.
"That's just an ignorant cliche of cartoon and tv show science! This Cyd, is real life." Barry informs her, annoyed with his friends slightly ignorant question.
"Yeah, you can't really run through walls!" Naldo piped in. "And I once tied myself to a train track to see if my dog could untie me, but he just...uh, nevermind." He trails off, slightly uncomfortable.
Shelby looks to Barry who looked as distressed as the girls felt, knowing he couldn't help Daisy anymore than they could. He felt helpless, but he knew that there was a small possibility that they could set up and experiment to help figure out Daisy's 'Medieval secret'.
"Gee, I don't know girls. If only you could jump back in time and find out what Daisy was hiding before she came here, or even before you fought Sebastian…" Barry hints sarcastically, hitting his forehead as the girls "ahh-ed" in realization.
Cyd took Shelby by the hand, leading her back into the house before wrapping her arms around Shelby, a light glow surrounding them consuming them back into time.
-XXX-
Barry headed into the Marcus' household, finding the young and fair princess curled beneath a blanket on the couch, Astrid beside her, stroking her hair as Daisy's eyes faded from vibrant blue to an unusual gray color.
"Sorry to intrude Mrs. M, but I'm here to see the fair maiden." He announces.
"Why that's just sweet of you to call her Barry." Astrid remarks before kissing Daisy's forehead and leaving the room.
Daisy sits up, resting a large, yellow, plastic salad bowl on her lap, lined with a garbage bag of what Barry could only presume was human bile. Daisy herself looked flushed and worried, weary from all the vomiting and guilt. Barry clears his throat, cautiously scooting towards a nervous Daisy.
"Barry, I care for you as a loving friend and loyal maiden should. But, there's something that I have to tell you before we can make this courtship official, and it's gonna shake you up real good. Which, by the way, is a phrase I hear girls at school use and I'm not quite sure why?"
Barry slips his hand nervously in hers, feeling her tension leave but her shoulders stay tight against her ears, tense, uneasy, shaky. He wanted to be there for her and knew that science couldn't explain why he felt that this was an appropriate response to her problem other than hormones, but he did, indeed, like it. The warmth of her small hands, curved nails, freshly painted by Shelby as an attempt to fit in with others her age.
"Daisy, we understand you've been feeling guilty about Sebastian, and maybe a little worried about him entering through a rift or something, but I promise, my brain will keep you safe."
"Did you not say muscles for a reason? Perhaps because you're not as built as Sebastian or men of my time and your brain couldn't save you." Daisy infers.
"He may have muscles, but inside that large chest is a small and hateful heart. He has no control over you anymore Daisy. You are in charge of your kingdom and own decisions, so if it's Sebastian you're worried about, don't. A queen doesn't need to marry a king to make her royalty."
"Well technically they do if they weren't born into the family."
"Yes, but you were born to fill the queen position regardless of whether you had a king or not, depending on your parent's death."
Daisy's uneasiness doesn't fade, but instead she feels her throat tighten at the thought of her parents. She hadn't seen them for years, but instead protected by her loving nanny in the tower without an explanation until now. But now that she had a reason for going back, to tell Sebastian that she didn't need him, she felt stronger, as in 'less' afraid.
"What if, there was already… sorta but not really… a king?" Daisy nervously mumbled, looking away and quickly down at her shoes.
"Weren't you promised to Sebastian?"
"By my parents, yes. However, there was this handsome forestman, we met after they perished when I was six. Promises aren't official documents."
Barry looks confused, pondering how it was possible that there was another man, and why she didn't seem concerned with him until now. Unless…
"Did Sebastian know of him?" He asks inquisitively, suddenly interested.
"We married at thirteen; Sebastian's jealousy grew so strong, he had his men seek to kill him, however he fled the country and hasn't been seen since. Sebastian refuses to look at me as a married woman, but his future wife, even after I broke the engagement."
Meanwhile, Cyd and Shelby had found themselves in the room of an aged and dangerous, weapon filled brick wall, an axe dangling from a chandelier just feet above the dining room table. Their clothes from their century still clothed their bodies, and they immediately realized that they had to search for Daisy's bedroom, steal her clothes and search for any clues as to what had happened. They didn't know the specific date they had jumped to, but had hoped to jump to a time before Sebastian had fought them.
"Where are you taking me?" They hear a familiar voice exclaim, followed by the slam of a large wooden door.
Cyd turns to Shelby, the time becoming obvious, before grabbing her shoulders and shaking her. "Daisy's capture!" She exclaims.
"But we already know her nanny helped her. She hid her from Sebastian to avoid Sebastian's arranged marriage."
"There's got to be more. We don't know why she's here, why we specifically jumped to this time, or how we'll help her." Shelby rambles nervously, pacing back and forth.
Cyd and Shelby follow the small weeps, presumably from who they assumed was Daisy, the day she was kidnapped and forced into the dark room in the tall tower.
"They can never know, but I'm going to take care of you both. That's the only way we can keep you from Sebastian's wrath. Just until you're well and you can flee!" Cyd and Shelby hear the small, delicate and elderly voice inform her, their ears tingling from being pressed up against the wooden door, and buzzing with thoughts.
"Daisy's sick?" Cyd wonders aloud.
"Is that why she came through the rift? Because we have the technology, care, and medicines to help her! We need to ask her how we can help." Shelby concludes.
"Or maybe we're helping her escape! She's supposed to be here in order to keep her safe. Maybe just until she's well, or maybe permanently, and that's what we're supposed to find out! " Cyd beams, feeling smarter than Barry for once.
"But who's "You both?" that her nanny mentioned?" Cyd corrects herself, before looking to Shelby with a creeping suspicion.
Cyd and Shelby flash back to the present, finding Barry and Daisy on the couch. The only difference was, when they had left, Daisy hadn't been crying and Barry hadn't been holding her hand.