Disclaimer: None of the characters are mine. All credit goes to Toby Whithouse, the BBC and all Being Human's wonderful writers.

A favour

Stepping through the door onto the brilliant white beach, Eve finally found Leo standing in the blue water, up to his knees. He had been very difficult to find. She'd never met him, which was the complication. She'd only heard of him from a few people who'd come across himin the few days after that fateful full moon, when the man before her and their ghostly friend had left him.

The first few kills of the current, brutal cycle had been preceded by a self-justifying, occasionally apologetic monologue.

Of these ghosts, the later ones described him talking, drunk on a new and unaccustomed deluge of other people's blood, about the "foolish dog and a tiresomely provincial cloud of ectoplasm" who had kept him caged for half a century. Then he'd ripped their throats out.

The earliest ones - the first had been only hours after the ghost had lost herself in a morning breeze - said that he said nothing before. But as they had walked through the door, he had apologised to them through tears and begged them not to tell Leo. She had pieced together everything she could find out about the mysterious Leo from these non-survivors' stories, and finally, though a friend of a friend of a friend of a friend, she had found him.

She'd heard about Leo quite by chance, in her hunt for Lord Hal. Of course, she'd decided upon using Lord Hal as her weapon very soon after she had discovered the scrolls' true meaning, after a failed attempt at taking matters into her own hands. He had spent, bar his recent campaign in the States, most of her existence in the country, which made access through her own timeline possible. He was also an irredeemable monster, which was useful. She had never met him either, of course. If she had, she would be alive now, in some kind of gilded cage.

But she'd had a lot of trouble finding out where exactly Lord Hal had been in the first few weeks of her life. The first time her family - Annie and Tom - had been aware of him was that bewildering morning when his voice had interrupted the Prime Minister's televised speech to the panicking nation, commanding the man and the watching audience to kneel before Mr Snow. The Prime Minister had not knelt - he had frozen in fear. His wide eyes had followed his invisible attacker's approach. Then his throat had burst open like ripe fruit. It was said that Lord Hal had stepped in to save Mr Snow the inconvenience of the bodyguards' futile volley of gunfire. The cameras had caught the noise of them firing. It was said he was the one who held the Home Secretary still to stare in horror at Mr Snow's coup d'état, and that he was the one who twisted her head halfway round just before the cameras cut out. Latest intelligence reported that Snow was in St Petersburg now.

Perhaps she shouldn't have been so shocked to find out how Lord Hal had passed the years before the fall. She'd grown up on stories about Mitchell, the vampire who tried to go clean. Except she knew how that story ended. A merciful stake to the heart to prevent him becoming a greater nightmare than he already was. Annie had loved Mitchell, but no such feeling clouded Eve's mind. Mitchell had needed to be put down, and the only thing that counted in his favour was that he'd recognised that fact and sought it out, in the end.

So she knew vampires did sometimes try and live without blood. But she also knew they always failed. Like Mitchell.

But there was something else uncanny about Lord Hal, other than his oddly familiar history with Leo and Pearl. While Mitchell had clearly had charisma - he could lead men - organisation and strategy were not his strong suit. And his bursts of violence were chaotic, frenzied and uncontrolled. Lord Hal, on the other hand, led rallies of thousands. He had had the fountains in Trafalgar Square filled with priests' blood. He set up the camps and the dog fights that had killed Tom. He had just led the campaign that had taken New York, the last free city on Earth. The victory posters had appeared weeks beforehand: "Hal York breaks New York" with that same handsome, smirking image they always used in front of the iconic skyline. Lord Hal's speciality was strategic, calculated cruelty. Although she wouldn't call anyone who took that much pleasure from violence a cold-blooded killer, metaphorically at least.

So it was a shock to learn that Lord Hal had spent fifty five dry years living above barbers in South end on Sea, with a gentle, jazz- loving man called Leo. That he was a werewolf was just icing on the cake.

The man who'd finally shown her where to find Leo was a bus driver called Ernest, who Leo had killed in a dog fight presided over by Lord Hal in 1955. Leo had found him, in the end, to apologise. Ernest liked him, although it was wordlessly decided between them that they wouldn't meet again. Eve had told Ernest that she was going to destroy Lord Hal - she left out how - and he was perfectly willing to assist her with that.

She'd come to ask Leo for a favour.

Leo turned to smile at her as soon as she stepped onto his beach, and beckoned her over. "Come on in, the water is lovely!"

She was wearing the only decent civilian clothes she had found. A long floral dress and a yellow cardigan. If she had had longer, or a bigger selection, it certainly wasn't what she'd have chosen to enter the afterlife in, but she had thought that her normal getup of camouflage combats would set most people on edge. She shrugged the cardigan off her shoulders, careful to leave it covering the ugly H that was seared deeply into her forearm, and joined him in the sea.

"The famous Eve! It is an honour." He kissed her hand.

So he knew who she was, sort of. As well as anyone else did at least. Her last minute costume change hadn't been a complete success. "Hello, Leo." she said. "Were you expecting me?"

"Young lady, I learned very early on not to expect anything, only to hope." He smiled sadly at the horizon. "I did not hope to see you, Eve, so early. I had hoped..." His words trailed off.

"I know. World's worst saviour ever. I must be a disappointment." Not for the first time since she'd read that final scroll, she wondered if Annie had known what it said. If Annie had let the world turn to ash for her. Jesus, she just trying to process that possibility left her numb.

"No!" said Leo. "Without you, what happened would have happened long before. You kept people alive, kept them fighting. You dedicated your life to helping people. No more can be asked of anyone." He lapsed into silence briefly, then added, "It wasn't fair, what they asked of you."

"Life's not fair." She droned the cliche automatically. "And neither is death."

They listened to the little waves washing against their legs for a while.

"I can guess what you're here for." said Leo.

She looked at him. "Oh yes?"

"You must be here about Hal. But I don't know why."

"How much did you watch, after you left?" she asked him carefully.

"By the time I found out how to see, they were both gone. Hal had... he had gone, and I couldn't see Pearl. I hoped that maybe she had found her door, that she would come over here and I would find her. But I never did."

"She went before Hal... Before he went bad again." She could hardly believe she was mincing her words to describe such a monster as Lord Hal. "Maybe he was holding it together for her, but he lost her." Was that true? Could it be? But her words seemed to bring some small crumb of comfort to Leo.

"I am glad to hear that." he said solemnly. "She would have done her very best to try and help him, you know."

"Did you really think he could change?"

"That man was the best friend I ever had. He told me, the first time we ever talked properly, that he had been many different men. My friend, he was a good man. But I... I don't think he exists anymore."

"Did you watch him after?" she pressed.

"How could I? I watched you - the humans and the werewolves, and the ghosts. But... I saw what Hal and the vampires did to the world."

Another silence. Neither cared to talk about what he had witnessed and she had lived through.

"Where are we?" she asked him.

"My hometown." he answered. "Well, if you just climb over those rocks to the next bay, the town is there."

"It's beautiful." Eve had spent most of her life hiding in safehouses, or literally underground. If she'd been alive, the sun here would have started to burn her within ten minutes. Now, she just enjoyed the sensation of her skin soaking in the heat. She could feel here, at least.

"Yes," he said, "but I thought it was boring. I wanted to go to England, to London. Make my fortune, listen to jazz bands, get some excitement." He smiled at the memory of his younger self. "I arrived a month after the coronation, I got scratched in winter '53, and caught by vampires in '55, then I met Hal. Quite enough excitement. I spent the rest of my life trying to get back to boring." A warm smile appeared on his face. "And I think I succeeded, mostly. With Hal and Pearl. It was a good life."

Eve wasn't sure she would describe her life as a good one. To her, it hadn't felt good, especially after she lost Annie, but she had at least thought she was fighting the good fight. Then it had turned out that just by carrying on breathing, she'd lost the war. That was hard to take. It was why she was here.

"I need to ask you for something, Leo." He looked at her, inviting her to continue. "I can stop what happened from happening, I can save the world just like everyone thinks I can, but I need something from you first."

"What is it?"

"Just a memory. Of you and Hal together."

His face fell. "I cannot tell you anything about the Hal I knew that would help. I told you, it's a different man, the one who... The one you know."

"You don't understand. I'm not looking for information. I can change things. Leo, I can stop the vampires taking over."

"Eve, they took over a long time ago. And you are dead, we can't change their world from here."

"Trust me, we can. I've seen it done, well, my mum has." Her stomach knotted as it did every time she thought of Annie. She wished she was with her, as she had every day since Annie had drifted away, but this really was Annie's field of expertise.

"How?" asked Leo, scepticism and hope struggling with each other on his face.

"Ghosts can step back through doors into their own past. Look at where you are - this is your childhood, right?"

Leo nodded, warily. He was following her, just about. He didn't quite believe.

"That's where I want to get to - my childhood. Right back to when the world fell... when I was a baby." She paused and glanced at Leo. He was listening, still, though she could see his doubt. "Except, I can't remember it, I was too young. That's why I need your help. I need a memory from that time."

He smiled kindly, and said warmly but firmly, "There are plenty of people here who remember that time, Eve." He was a good reader of people. He knew she wasn't telling him everything.

She had anticipated this, and was ready with a plausible-enough answer. "Yes, but you're a werewolf, you see, so there's a better connection with..."

"Eve, please just tell me. Why does it have to be me? What is your interest in Hal?"

Eve sighed. Time for the nasty truth. "I want to meet Hal. Actually, I want Hal to meet me, as a baby."

Leo's face wrinkled further in confusion. "Why?"

"Because he will kill me, the baby, and that's what needs to happen. That was what was meant to happen." She shuddered. She wasn't just signing her own death warrant. Tom would be what, about twenty? Tough as he was, he wouldn't survive a fight with an Old One like Lord Hal. And Annie. God knows what state she would be in. She'd have lost Mitchell a month or two before, and Nina and then George in the past week or two. She wouldn't outlive the baby by minutes before she vanished, again, cut loose from the world like a balloon slipping from a child's grip.

"Kill you?" Leo's voice was still just confused. What she'd said hadn't sunk in yet.

"You know the prophecy that says I'm the saviour of mankind? It's true. But I have to die. I die, the vampires die. A lot of other people live."

He didn't say anything, or look at her.

"I only found out just before I died. It's why I'm here. I'm trying to put it right."

"Put it right? How can killing a baby put anything right?" His voice broke from bewilderment into anger.

"Leo, I'm not murdering anyone! I'm... I'm sacrificing myself. This is my decision. I just need help carrying it out."

"So you want me, and Hal, to do your dirty work for you?"

"I would do it if I could. I actually tried. Turns out you can't be in the same place as yourself - ghost and living." The only ghost rule she had found out for herself rather than from Annie.

"Why Hal?"

There's no one I trust more to rip apart a baby in their cot she thought. "He's a vampire. He doesn't know the last part of the prophecy yet. He thinks that I'm the human saviour who will destroy the vampires. So he'll kill me before I get the chance." Then she lied. "Why him in particular? Because I found you. He's the only vampire I could reach." And I need him to get past Annie and Tom, and I need someone serious to do that.

"Hal wouldn't kill a baby." said Leo with confidence.

"How many real, live human beings, in all that time you were in Southend, did Hal meet?"

Leo was silent.

"I bet it wasn't many. And if it ever did happen, it didn't reassure you enough to let him out more often did it?"

"I did not keep him in chains! Maybe he never left the flat, but it was his choice. He could have left whenever he wanted, but he stayed."

"He knew what would happen if he got out. So did you. We both know what happened when you left."

"I didn't leave him, Eve, I died. I didn't have a choice."

"I know, I know. To be honest, I'm amazed you kept him clean all that time. But he can't do it without you, Leo. He couldn't do it. I'm not blaming you - it was inevitable."

Leo had fallen silent again, and she sensed his resolve failing. "What exactly are you going to do? What do you want from me?" he asked in a voice that sounded tired to the bone.

"All I need is access to Hal through one of your memories. I'm going to get him into my - the baby's - house, then I'll let his nature take its course."

Leo remained silent, and stock still. She pressed her point. "Maybe you're right, maybe your Hal is better than I think he is and he won't touch the baby. Then he walks out and history carries on exactly as it did. But it would be better for everyone if he killed the baby, and saved the world in the process." She looked at him, anxiously waiting for his response. "I just need access to him, and I need you for that. I need a memory from that time."

After a long moment, he spoke.

"You are not just asking me to kill you. You're asking me to damn my best friend's soul."

"He doesn't have a soul, Leo!" she snapped. "Do you know how many people that monster has killed?"

Leo turned away from her. Her voice became a snarl.

"Fine, look away. You've had that luxury all this time. I haven't. I was there listening to the reports as they came in from all those dying cities. He didn't even have to show up to slaughter all those people. Did you hear how he came up with the plan to finally take the Vatican, Mecca and Jerusalem? They managed to hold out for a long while, but he was the one who told the vampires to..."

"Stop!"

Leo's shoulders had slumped, and even here in his own world, his form seemed blurred at the edges. She had won this battle. She was a little closer to putting the world to rights. "Show me." she said.

A betrayal

Leo walked with her through the corridor that he'd stepped into all those years ago. He didn't tell her, but it looked a lot like the one he'd run down to freedom with Hal on that night in 1955. He showed her the right door, and watched her fierce concentration as she fought her way across the worlds and into the airwaves of the radio. It wasn't the right kind of door to allow her to step through to the other world - no one had died here. Instead, the door led through to an exact copy of the barber shop as it had been that day, and they could hear the voices of Leo and Hal, and Louis Armstrong, through the radio the two worlds shared.

"What will happen to us?" Leo asked Eve.

"I don't know. I think we'll both just disappear. Or I will - I won't even exist if this works. I don't know if you'll notice anything change."

He had meant "us" as Pearl, Hal and himself, as they were in Southend. This memory was of a sunny Monday morning in the barber shop. Hal was arranging his dominoes, and Leo was just enjoying the music on the radio, when Pearl walked in to complain about the spider. She had bickered with Hal about whose turn it was to get rid of it, until Leo had stepped in with the solution, and off the two of them went to deal with it. A couple of minutes later, they had come back down the stairs again. Pearl had the huge spider trapped under a glass, its legs flailing. Following her was Hal, flustered because she wasn't doing it quite right in his opinion. "Careful. Careful! He's going to get out! Pearl, be careful!"Despite Hal's fears, they had managed to get the spider out of the front door, and then it was time for a cup of tea.

It had been a very ordinary day. It had been Leo's last ordinary day. The next day, he'd been too ill to open the shop or even get out of bed, and he had died two weeks later. He hadn't made it to the next full moon. He had died in his sleep, late at night. He had wanted to say goodbye to the two of them, but when his door appeared, he had been compelled to step through.

He didn't want to stay to see what Eve would say to Hal to turn him into the monster she knew. He had given her the key to destroy his friend, but he couldn't bear to watch the moment of betrayal. He had worried from almost the very beginning how Hal would cope without him. He had not dreamed it would be as bad as it was though. Perhaps Eve would just explain everything to Hal. This is what happens if you do not do this.Would that make it better, if Hal made the decision?

Maybe Eve was right and Hal didn't really have a soul to damn. But Leo was afraid that hedid.

"Goodbye, Eve."

She turned back to him, eyes focusing. Something in them told him she might know what he was going through.

"Goodbye, Leo. Thank you."

"Please. Don't."

He walked away down the corridor, alone, heading back to that beach when life had been simple. He wished he would disappear.

Epilogue

They were watching the television in their little sitting room above the barber shop. They watched Hal slicing the burger buns with the kind of precision normally associated with brain surgery. Leo wondered briefly where the camera was. It was only a cheap little cafe, not what you'd expect to be guarded by much CCTV. Besides, if it was a real camera, they wouldn't see Hal at all. He didn't worry about it too much.

Tom - a boy whose tough appearance was greatly mismatched with his sweet disposition - stepped through the door curtain into the kitchen. "Bit of a queue formin', mate."

Hal stacked another bun onto a precise pyramid. "I'm nearly finished."

"Got to take some of these now, mate, if s'alright, yeah?" said Tom, scooping an armful of the bread.

Hal looked briefly horrified, but took a deep breath and went back to slicing the next bun. "Not at all!" The cheer in his voice was only slightly forced. Leo only heard it because he knew him.

A small part of him was sad, and he told Pearl.

She nudged him in the ribs. "Oh, give over. You're just jealous because Hal's found himself another friend to boss him around."

But it wasn't that at all. He was happier than he'd thought possible. He was finally with Pearl, and Hal was settling in as well as could be expected with the strange new family the angel had led them to. He strongly suspected this might be heaven, and if it wasn't, then it might as well be. He wished he could thank her, but she had not spoken to him again.

He couldn't put a finger on what the sadness was. The closest he could get was the feeling of waking up from a dream and remembering the emotion but not the dream itself.

But that was alright. It would fade.

Paperclaire's comments: I wrote this before For the Record – if you've read both the connection is very obvious! - but now it works as a sort-of-sequel to that story. I would put it chapters, but then the two last chapters would be really short. I hope you liked it, please do let me know either way!