This is a fluffy little tag I forgot I wrote a few months ago. It's meant to be a missing scene from immediately after the Time Team returns from the Alamo. I so love this show - I really, really hope it gets renewed! #RenewTimeless
"I don't want anybody else. Look, I – trust – you. You are the one that I trust. Rufus needs you; I need you. Okay?"
Wyatt yanks one of her hands from his face and turns away, yearning to be free of her need. He hates her a little, in that moment. Hates her desperate, beautiful face; hates the way she's right; hates the way she's pulling him back from a bloody but self-satisfying act of contrition and conclusion and maybe even reunion with all he's lost.
The heartbreak is all over her face when he turns back and he knows he can't leave her. Them. He can't leave his people.
He's still holding her hand when he tells her: "Get ready to run."
The women's locker room at Mason Industries is quickly becoming what feels like her last safe haven.
Lucy stands in front of the floor-length mirror and stares at an image she thinks should be in black and white in the pages of a history book. A survivor of the Alamo looks back at her, covered in soot and flecks of mud and blood. Sweat from a Texas sun, too hot even in a February of almost two hundred years ago, is rapidly drying on her scalp and neck. Her eyes are huge and wild in her thin face.
She decides she needs to get out of the Alamo survivor's clothes. Her hat is gone – lost somewhere in the past, disintegrated by now – so she pulls the pins out of her hair with shaking fingers and then collapses on the floor to unlace her boots. Soon, she's standing under a hot, steady stream of water in the shower and shuddering in relief. She dresses quickly after the shower. Her clothes are light and flimsy compared to the heavy cotton and muslin from the 1800's, but they help her settle back into herself; they help her breathe again.
She walks out of the locker room to find Wyatt sitting on the ground, back against the wall in the hallway. She nearly trips over him.
"Whoa, there," he teases, and (of course, because he's him) puts a steady hand on her abdomen to keep her from falling over.
"Wyatt! What are you doing?"
"I was waiting for you," he says, and pats the concrete next to him. "Sit."
She frowns, but does as he asks and sits. It's only then that she notices the extremely large knife he's holding and her mouth falls open.
"Oh, my God," she breathes, staring at it. "Is that –"
Wyatt gives a dry chuckle.
"Yup."
"Wow," she says, and gratefully accepts it when he gives it to her to examine. The Bowie knife – almost a sword, really – is unpolished and heavier than she had expected.
"You know, I'm kind of grateful the attack happened sooner than it was supposed to," she comments, still inspecting the knife closely. She doesn't notice Wyatt examining her just as closely.
"Why?"
"Well, John Smith told Sam Houston that Bowie was on his deathbed from some kind of illness when the attack happened – the first time. I guess it was a sudden illness, because he didn't seem sick to me. So he got to go out fighting on two feet. Although," she smiles sadly, "I'm sure he was just as deadly either way. His mother is recorded as saying 'I'll wager there were no wounds found in his back,' after she found out he'd been killed."
Wyatt returns her sad smile.
"I suppose you're going to tell me I've got to take this to the museum in San Antone?"
Lucy's lips twitch and she tips her head to the side.
"Actually, the original Bowie knife has never been found, and I don't think you could ever authenticate the finding of this one, so…no. And he gave it to you." Lucy hands the knife back to him. "Sounds to me like it's yours."
Wyatt nods and puts the knife down on the floor between them. They sit in silence for a long moment and Wyatt takes her by surprise when he grabs her hand. She looks at him, but he keeps his eyes on the ground.
"I owe you an apology."
She relaxes back into her sitting position.
"For?"
He doesn't say anything and she understands. She waits for him to break the silence again, but he doesn't – just continues to hold her hand, not meeting her eyes.
"Agitation and lack of focus," she says in a low voice.
He looks at her now, anxiety written across his brow.
"Hypervigilance. Flashbacks accompanied by dilated pupils and shock. And…thoughts of self-harm or suicide."
He swallows hard and looks back down at the ground.
"You have PTSD," she concludes. "And you only owe me an apology if you let me apologize first."
Wyatt looks up at her in confusion. She squeezes his hand sympathetically.
"I do, too," she tells him. "From, uh…a couple different experiences, but mostly from the car accident I told you about. You know when you helped talk me over the hump? That was me coming out of a flashback. So if you think I owe you an apology for being triggered by my PTSD, then yes, you may apologize."
He opens his mouth, looking offended.
"Of course you don't owe me an apology," he starts, upset, and she smiles wanly and interrupts him.
"Then neither do you."
He looks like he wants to argue, but he ultimately slumps back against the wall and turns his face up to stare at the ceiling.
"You like being right, don't you," he asks rhetorically.
"I do enjoy it, yes," she replies.
"Anyone ever tell you you're kind of a smart ass?"
"Not to my face. Why, did you hear something?"
He finally cracks a smile and shakes his head. They sit in silence again. Just as she's about to bid him goodnight, he seems to remember something.
"Wait here a sec," he tells her as he darts into the men's locker room. She leans against the wall, grateful for the stability, until he comes back holding a small cardboard box held together by Amazon packing tape. He holds it out to her.
She takes it wordlessly. It's already been cut open, so she lifts the lid to find an orange escape hammer – used for cutting through seat belts and breaking through car windows in case of an emergency like a sinking car – sitting inside on a bed of bubble wrap.
"I'm not sure if you have one, but you should keep it in your glove box," he says in a gravelly voice. "Just in case…"
Lucy's eyes fill with tears and she flings her arms around Wyatt's neck. He seems surprised, grunting a little as she collides with him, but he wraps his arms around her in return.
"Thank you," she chokes out, and his embrace tightens.
"Don't mention it," he murmurs.