I've been writing various things for a Teslen Appreciation Week that'll be happening on Tumblr this month, and I've been rewatching the show (yes, I admit, mostly for Tesla, but also for the lols). I'd been fixated on Bhalasaam for a while before writing this - don't ask me why. This is what happens when I have time on my hands and I can't get the fic I should be working on to do what I need it to do. (It's all ok now though, the other fic is behaving.) Enjoy!

It was quiet in Gregory Magnus's office overlooking Praxis. A fire crackled in the hearth, more for the ambience than heat, whilst father and daughter sat opposite each other. They had been talking easily for the past half an hour, but Helen had grown quiet in the last few minutes.

"Father, the keys in Bhalasaam..."

"What of them?"

Helen swallowed uneasily, her throat suddenly dry. "Why did you put my test with Nikola's?"

Gregory regarded her for a few minutes, unsure she would appreciate his candour. "Helen, do you remember your first year at Oxford? You and Tesla were always up to something, be it your experiments, or his..." He sighed, and stood from his chair, moving to the fireplace. "I must admit, I couldn't quite understand his charm, but you were happy. Then the source blood..."

Helen nodded – this was an old argument, one they had had many times before.

"You were suddenly doctor to all four of those men, and they clambered for your attention. How often did you sit in your lab, surrounded by them? No matter." He looked into his glass of brandy, watching the firelight through the dark liquid. "Druitt asked for your hand."

"He asked you first?" she asked, aghast. John had been so untraditional in his courtship of her that she had simply assumed he had asked her first.

"It was the done thing Helen, you know that," he reminded her gently from the mantelpiece. "He asked." The unspoken, 'Tesla did not,' lingered in the air.

Helen chuckled darkly, "Nikola thought you liked us as a couple."

Gregory shook his head. "If I had my choice-"

"It was to wind up John... He also realised, quite quickly, that you didn't like him," she interrupted.

"Oh?"

"The electric tunnel, for his test? He wasn't expecting to be shocked on the way back once he had the key."

Gregory drank some of his brandy, enjoying the warmth from the alcohol and the fire. "Couldn't make it easy for him… You softened the blow." A statement, not a question – he knew his daughter.

Helen's eyes became unfocused as she remembered his pained expression. "I told him he was an acquired taste."

Gregory's lungs let out a puff in amusement, before he sat back in the armchair opposite Helen. "He was jubilant when he changed, but you were... more reserved. You saw the danger in his transformation... It scared you."

"But to accept John?" she asked, incredulously.

He smiled self-deprecatingly. "I was unaware of his role in the Whitechapel murders when I gave my permission..." A pause. "I thought his task better suited with James than you."

Helen's face darkened. "John had a taste for killing long before the blood. He hid it well." Her head canted to the side as she realised something. "James?"

Gregory shrugged. "Forgive an old man wanting different for his favourite child."

"Only child," Helen replied, laughing. "But… James?" she asked again, incredulous.

Sobering, he placed his glass on the table between them. "I have always wanted you happy, Helen. I would have preferred James, but if Druitt made you happy then I was happy."

The fire crackled. A clock ticked softly somewhere close to his desk. Helen sighed. "You've done it again, Father. You've not answered my question."

Gregory deflated. "I knew James was needed to help Druitt with his test. Griffin would understand his task without assistance."

Helen nodded, eyes unfocused again in a memory. "He did spend an awful amount of time invisible."

Gregory's eyebrow quirked at the gentle flush of her cheeks. There were things he did not need to know about his daughter. "Tesla, I knew, would need a firm hand to guide him to the correct choice."

"I was the carrot, you mean?"

Gregory bristled at her tone. "I didn't understand his charms, dearest, but I understood that all four men would follow you to the ends of the earth."

"Or a vampire city by the Himalayas," she added.

He shrugged one shoulder. "You were, still are, the leader of your merry band of men. Every one of your charges would barrel into the breach with you. Three came with you to Hollow Earth, even though you had only the barest idea of what would be here waiting."

"You used his feelings for me to keep him in check." Another statement. They were silent for a few minutes, digesting everything. Helen's demeanour softened first. "He's not the worst person in the world. Arrogant, egotistical, with a penchant for megalomania, yes, but since his devamping he's…" She looked at her father for direction. "He's more like he was, before the source blood. I wouldn't be here if not for his vampire shield."

"But you miss the vampire the blood brought forth?"

She nodded, almost ashamed.

"Have you…?"

"He's tried gene therapies." Helen laughed mirthlessly. "He tried to capture a multipede whose DNA had changed because of the blood… He even asked for mine." She looked down at her hands. "He's depressed. Having based his plans on what an immortal can do, he's suddenly rudderless." Her eyes rolled. "It's a bit annoying to be perfectly frank. He won't drop the subject when he's without a task…"

"You can't fix that," he told her quietly. The small clock on his desk chimed seven, breaking the ambience of quiet sharing. Sighing - the moment had passed - he stood, stick in one hand, the other extended to his quiet daughter. "Come, Ranna is expecting us."