Acknowledgements:

Omi as always
The BTN8rs - with apologies
The BTN Chatters - for their support

Disclaimers:

"A vague disclaimer is nobody's friend" - Willow, Buffy the Vampire Slayer
I do not own any Numb3rs characters nor do I have any rights to
anything related to the TV show Numb3rs. I plead fair use and claim
only my own writing and characters.


England was cold, damp, rainy and nothing looked less than a century old including the ancient pub he was waiting in.

Charlie had come in and ordered a pint of beer: when in Rome...

It felt strange to be twenty-one, stranger still not to be carded, but he was finally starting to get the hang of being an adult.

Which was handy for someone with a PhD after their name.

He glanced at his watch, a present from his brother last Hanukkah, to find the person he'd come to meet was late. Being in applied mathematics meant his work touched many fields so when half the scientists he'd met at Oxford talked up a new PhD as someone he had to meet, he'd agreed to it and let them set it up for him.

So far other than the science England hadn't made that much of an impression on him. The food was awful, the weather dismal and everyone seemed to smoke, leaving his clothes smelling of cigarettes so badly he had to do laundry all the time just to have coats to wear out and about.

Still, he'd found things to write home about and promised his mother to make a side trip to Stratford-upon-Avon to see where Shakespeare lived even if he couldn't figure out the appeal.

A year at most. He couldn't imagine staying here past the end of the year he'd originally agreed to for his post-doc work.

"Dr. Eppes?"

Charlie looked up to find a stunning blonde smiling at him. He felt a little flutter in his chest at her gaze. English girls weren't this pretty - she had to be from somewhere else. Heaven perhaps...

"Yes?"

She slid into the booth opposite, gesturing to a waitress who seemed to know her for a pint of her own, before slipping out of her coat and putting her purse aside.

"I'm Dr. Berry. Everyone said we should meet so here I am."

He felt lightheaded, dizzy with surprise and delight. This beautiful creature was the owner of the brilliant mind that had written the neuroscience papers that had drawn him in enough to agree to this meeting.

"Dr. Eppes?" She looked at him, quizzically, when he failed to respond.

"Please..." Charlie offered her his hand. "Call me Charlie..."