Rewritten, editing mistakes and bits.
It's on every news channel and in every paper the next day: that beautiful old building in Old City burned to the ground. Addison has the whole thing fenced in. He tries to talk to Will, tell him that he wanted Magnus out of the way, yes, but he didn't want her dead. Abby keeps telling him that she's alive, because she's Magnus, but Will doesn't think so.
Addison lets the Sanctuary team and Co. (though is there a team if there's no Sanctuary?) go through the rubble. Will, Abby, Kate, Henry and Nikola begin the next Monday. Declan flies in on Tuesday. Garris comes up on Wednesday and, with Declan's help, starts getting the abnormals from the Homeland to other Sanctuaries.
They move Biggie's body to the city morgue, with Captain Franklin's utter discretion She's back on their side, it seems, as is the mayor. They keep his body locked down until a proper burial can be arranged.
Not everything was destroyed, but 99% was. They find a few things, some charred photos, Henry finds some of his tech equipment. Nikola moans about Helen's wine collection being destroyed (It contained a hundred years worth of fine wine!), but he's silent other than that. He doesn't believe his old friend survived either.
On Thursday, they find the best and least expected thing to survive.
Some of the rubble near what's left of the wall moves. Will and Declan are on it, believing an abnormal to have survived and be stuck. What they find is a blonde woman, in heavily ripped black clothing. And they both recognize her hair. Declan gently flips her over.
Ashley.
"What the hell..." Declan says, but Will just picks Ashley up and tells him they'll ask questions later. He calls for Henry, who repeats Declan's exclamation and takes his practically-sister in his arms, carries her to their current HQ (a camper), and lays her on the couch.
Will checks her out: her pulse is steady, her skin is pale, she's dirty, but looks relatively healthy.
Henry cleans her up and Kate lends some of her clothes. They take turns watching her, while the others keep going through the rubble. They start a clean-up op.
When Ashley wakes up, she says that the last thing she remembers is her mom crying, then fuzzy colours, then black, then this. Nikola says that her atoms must have been caught in the Sanctuary's shield. (And it's the only thing that makes sense, other than a freaking miracle, so that's the accepted version.) Henry runs some tests, and it's really her. "Lose one Magnus, gain another," Henry says. She doesn't take her mother's death too well, but she doesn't leave either. Henry stays with her most of the time.
They acquire an apartment big enough for all of them to stay in for the moment.
Will and Abby quit SCIU. Addison doesn't argue, just refers them back to the FBI. Abby accepts, Will does not.
The next day, Ashley and Kate come running back from their outing.
"I saw Mom!" "We saw Magnus!"
Nikola says they must be hallucinating from the stress, but they swear up and down.
Three days later, Henry sees her.
Their stories corroborate. They saw her going into an abandoned warehouse near the outskirts of Old City.
Will takes two days to stake out the place. He doesn't see Magnus, but Henry says there are heat signatures under the building matching that of humans.
The next day, Will goes in. It's a run-of-the-mill abandoned warehouse. Dirty, damp, and dark. There's a hatch with a faded radioactive sign on it, and Will figures that's the safest bet. He goes down and there's a retinal scanner. It opens to Will's eyes. The door next to the scanner opens to a cave.
Magnus is standing before him. She's wearing a dress he hasn't seen before. She looks peaceful.
She repeats the same words she said to him four years ago, but makes a joke about him already having a job. He tells her he quit SCIU. She takes him deeper into the cave.
Will is speechless. An underground Sanctuary. So green and so huge, with a waterfall. So very Magnus. A Praxian transport system lies overhead, and a transport pod shoots by.
He asks if he gets a raise and she replies "Absolutely not." Again mirroring their first adventure four years ago, she asks him "Shall we begin?"
Will replies an affirmative, before remembering another important matter.
"Magnus, there's something you need to know, but you won't believe me unless I show you."
"Then show me," she replies. Will brings Magnus back to their apartment. Henry is playing on his new laptop, Garris and Declan are on the phone with the London Sanctuary, Ashley, Abby, and Kate are watching TV, Nikola is laying on the couch, drinking wine.
Henry shoots up and hugs Magnus hard enough to make her wheeze, Kate does the same. Nikola does the same. Garris shakes her hand and Declan and Abby gives her short hugs. Magnus and Ashley stare at each other.
"It's really her, Doc," Henry says quietly. "We checked." A sob breaks out of Magnus and the women rush to each other. Everyone gets a little teary-eyed from the reunion.
After every single question is answered, Magnus takes everyone to the Underground Sanctuary, where she says she has a surprise of her own.
She shows everyone around, keeping an arm firmly on Ashley at all times, as if she'll disappear if Magnus lets go.
When Magnus takes them to the lab, three people are there. They all turn around.
Ranna Seneschal, Gregory Magnus, and a thin brunette woman no one recognizes. Magnus introduces her as Dr. Charlotte Benoit, a virologist, and Will notices the way the two women look at each other. And by the side-looks everyone else is exchanging, they all notice, too.
"I thought you two died in Hollow Earth, no offense," Henry says.
"When I had to relive the twentieth and early twenty-first centuries," Magnus explains, "knowing what would happened, I used to opportunity to get Ranna and my father out of Praxis before Worth's energy flow destroyed the city."
Magnus has really thought this out. She's already set up rooms for everyone, though she didn't know about Ashley, has stocked the fridge with everything everyone likes, and has Henry's lab almost exactly copied into a large room with much more equipment.
She hopes to move many of the world's abnormals to this Sanctuary slowly, while shutting down those and bringing the staff to this Sanctuary is they so wish. A few will stay up, but the entire Network can no longer work with the 21st century.
Garris and Kate leave after another month, with promises to come up when they can. Erika joins this Sanctuary and Magnus has a room already set up specifically for her and the baby and their treatments. Declan leaves for the London Sanctuary, which is one of those to stay up. Abby officially joins the team.
Abby and Henry spend a lot of their time getting Ashley up to speed on the world and showing Ranna how surface life works. Nikola begins a new wine collection.
They bury Biggie in the Underground Sanctuary, with a headstone and all.
The moving of the abnormals is very slow, but they have more than enough room. Some new staff join, some go to the FBI or CIA, but most move to other Sanctuaries. The stories of the Old City Sanctuary are quite common now
It's the end of the Old City Era, but the beginning of the Underground Age.
While watching Sanctuary For None, I kept repeating "do not cry" and I didn't! ...Until Biggie started getting beaten. And then I sobbed. Ugly sobbing, I tell you, it was gross. Luckily, they became happy tears in the end.
This drabble-like-whatever is most of my headcanons regarding the aftermath of the Sanctuary going BOOM! Plus, I loved Ranna and Gregory and Ashley, so I had to bring them back to life, and Charlotte was too damn awesome not to have her in the Underground Sanctuary. I really 'ship Charlotte and Helen.
Thanks for reading,
-Lucy