A/N: KNOCK, KNOCK. I originally planned to bring the content of Chapter 2, Chapter 3 and Chapter 4 in one chapter. But my inspiration said otherwise. It decided to turn it into a 3-Parter. So basically the second and the third belong together.

This chapter was a bit harder to write and it is a bit longer than the last ones. I'm sorry if Claude and Steve are a little OOC. This idea just wouldn't leave my head, and I figured this was a way to write it. Hopefully a good one.

Thank you for every follow, favorite and review. It means a lot to me and it always makes my day.

KTF CLM

23.07.2026

Steve Jinks had been in the surgery room for hours now, so he went in front of the door for a moment. The room was down in the Warehouse, close to the Feng Shui spiral. He would need about three minutes to get there, so he decided to take the risk. If something happened, they could call him on the Farnsworth. In fact, he always carried the device with him.

Except for that one New Year's Eve. He smiled as he made his way through the rows of the Warehouse. Steve had been planning this one night for a long time. Until the last second he wasn't sure if he found the right place and the right moment. But there was one thing that he was totally sure of all along: He got the right woman.

31.12.2015

Steve had never been so scared in his entire life. Every day they had to deal with crazy maniacs and magical artifacts. Hell, he was already dead once. But this was different. This one night would hopefully change his life forever. Or rather assure that it wouldn't change anymore, because he couldn't imagine it any better.

He and Claudia had just started dating in April 2015. That was only a few months ago, but they had known each other for years already. And he could deny it as much as he wanted, but he had known she was so much more than a friend to him long before they got romantically involved. There was no one he could connect to like he could with her. They were so different, but they always seemed to understand each other. Of course he wasn't and would never be a computer genius. And she wasn't and would never be a master of mediation. But they always balanced each other out.

If she had an adrenaline shock because she was angry or excited, he was always able to calm the redhead down. If he was overthinking something or if he was worried, she was always able to cheer him up and to help him to make the right decision.

Just like she did it with him and Emma. Afterwards, Steve couldn't really understand how he could have been mad at his mother for so long. She missed Livi just like he did. They had both lost her. But in his rage he had forgotten that. He didn't understand his mother's decision back then. He had just lost one of the most important people in his life, and she defended the man who took her from him.

But after Claudia brought him and Emma to talk to each other, he understood. He was still angry, he was still sad. And so was she. But she didn't want another family to live through this too, no matter who this family was or what a single one of them did.

Both, Steve and Claudia, had already lost so much. He had lost his sister and his father, and he had lost years with his mother. She had lost her parents, and even though she got both of them back eventually, she had lost Joshua and Claire. Not to mention that she lost him, too.

But they had won so much since they were here. They both got a place to call home. They won people that were there when they needed them. They got an insight into a world, from which only so few people knew about. And now, they had each other. And if the choice was theirs, they always would.

If his loss taught Steve one thing, then that he should hold onto the things he still had instead of grieving after what he lost. He was a Buddhist. He was supposed to want what he had, not what he didn't have. He didn't have Olivia in person anymore, but he would always carry his sister in his heart. And he had Claudia, alive and in person. So, he could honestly say he was happy with what he had.

The drive to the Warehouse went by in silence. He felt that she studied him from the passenger's seat, wondering why he was so quiet all day. She couldn't know that he was just afraid of telling her what he actually wanted at the Warehouse before it was the right time.

He had thought about this so long, but this time she couldn't help him with his decisions. He had to prepare this all on his own. She couldn't tell him what she wanted. He couldn't just ask her how she wanted this moment of her life to be. And for once he was scared that maybe he could understand something wrong. That he didn't know what she wanted.

They got out of his Prius and walked towards the entrance of the giant building. But when they were pacing down the umbilicus, Claudia finally had enough of the silence. She took a deep breath in and stopped halfway through the white aisle. He turned around to face her, his usually calm attitude fighting against nervousness and even slight panic. He tried to keep his expression as contemplative and casual as somehow possible, silently praying that his plan would work out somehow. He needed her to follow him to their destination. And this was definitely the wrong place.

Claudia crossed her arms in front of her chest, annoyance written across her face. "Alright, that's it. Tell me what's wrong!"

He shook his head, an obviously nervous laugh escaping his lips. "Nothing's wrong, Claude. What should be wrong?"

"Oh, please! I don't need to be a living lie detector to see that you're not telling me the truth! You barely even looked at me all day. You didn't say more than absolutely necessary to me. It's like you're hiding something from me! I thought we agreed to leave secrets behind us after everything we've been through. Besides, it was your idea to spend this evening together. But the way it is now, I could have just as well gone to Josh in Geneva or to Claire in NYC. Maybe you would have talked to me on the phone. Probably more than right now and right here!"

For a moment Steve could just stand there with his mouth hanging agape, stunned by her impromptu rant. He knew it wouldn't be easy to keep this from her, but he definitely didn't expect her to break out like this. He closed his mouth, opened it, and then closed it again. He wanted to say something, but he didn't know what.

Claudia shook her head in disbelieve. "Okay, you know what? I don't want this to ruin my start into the new year. Let's go get your Farnsworth so we can head back to the B&B ASAP." She walked past him, pausing only for the newly installed retina scan to do its job before she entered the office. After he closed the door to the umbilicus behind them, she turned around to face him again. "I hope you at least know where you left it."

Steve nodded, still a little bit taken aback. He cleared his throat, tilting his head towards the endless aisles and rows. He hoped she would get the hint, so he could keep his words, and with them the risk of ruining his surprise, at a minimum.

Her eyes widened. "You left it down there? Oh, that's just great! This'll take hours!"

This time he shook his head, earning a confused glare from his impatient partner. "It's more up there than down there."

"What do you mean 'up there'?"

He almost seemed to shrink in front of her, his voice so quiet that she could barely understand what he said. "Earlier today Artie sent me to fix a light bulb. I think I left it on one of the upper shelves…"

At first Claudia just stared at her boyfriend in disbelieve. Gathering her thoughts, she remembered that Artie indeed gave Steve the keys for the hydraulic ramp earlier.

He couldn't help the smile that appeared on his face when Claudia turned around and went to the filing cabinet. The redhead pulled out one of the boxes and took the keys for the remote of the cherry picker, then making her way out onto the patio and down the stairs. Suddenly, she stopped dead in her tracks and turned to face her partner once again. The woman just barely realized that she had no idea where to go.

"In what section?" she asked, waiting for him to tell her in which part of the Warehouse he had left the device. Or rather above which part. She sighed, took a step aside and motioned for him to lead the way.

He walked past her, glad that she already seemed to calm down a little again. She was still tense and obviously not amused, but she was talking to him. "It's not far from here. One of the closest aisles to the office."

They actually just needed about a minute to reach their destination, even though it might as well have felt like an eternity to both of them. For two entirely different reasons, of course. The cherry picker was still in place, but right now back on the ground.

He took a step back, hoping she would understand the silent message. Luckily, she did. The redheaded genius opened the gate and stepped onto the ramp. Steve followed suit, closing the gate behind him.

"On which shelf did you leave it?" she asked him impatiently.

To her surprise he gently pushed her aside and worked on the terminal himself. What she didn't know, was that he had done this about a hundred times just in this past week. He had made sure she would stand on the right side. Directly in front of the shelf. The agent pushed a couple of buttons and the ramp slowly gained height.

When she spotted the communication device on one of the higher shelves she already tried to reach it, while Steve stopped the hydraulic ramp. When Claudia got a closer look she stilled her movements. Next to the Farnsworth, she spotted two of her precious Mini Teslas. She assumed one of them was the one she had designed for Steve. She was a little angry and maybe even a bit hurt that he had really forgotten it there. She had spent hours over hours with designing, building, improving and engraving the minimized weapon for him.

She turned around, sending him a questioning glance. "Steve? Is that the Tesla I made you? And is the other one mine? I've been looking for it everywhere the past two days and you know that! I was already considering building a new one!"

He shrugged and simply said, "I don't know."

And that forced nonchalance really ticked his girlfriend off.

"You don't know? What do you mean, you don't know?"

Steve was struggling to control himself. He didn't mean to make her angry in first place, but now that he was in the middle of his plans, he had to risk something to hopefully get his happy ending after all. "I don't know. Why don't you just look for yourself?" He had to keep up his contemplative mask when he said the last sentence. If everything would work out as he had planned it, she had to turn around now. And again, luckily she did.

Claudia turned back towards the shelf and stood on her toes to reach out for the first gun. She was right. This one was his, with the engraved 'Jinksy' on the golden surface. She carefully placed it on the ramp and reached out for the second. She picked it up and took a closer look at it.

Suddenly, her eyes widened and her breath got caught up in her throat.

She ran her thumb over the small golden disc. This wasn't there before. The redhead had only added it to his for the graving. And now, hers had a graving too. On the left side of the gun it was simply her name, 'Claude'. But on the right side of the gun there were five letters that were melting her heart. In the first line it said 'KTF' and in the second were his initials 'SJ'. "Keep the faith." she whispered quietly, all rage forgotten. She would always remember the last words she heard him say before she lost him back then. It was years ago, but she still knew every single line he said in the video. She opened her mouth to say something, but she quickly shut it again.

That was when she saw it. At the end of the gun barrel was something shimmering. Claudia took a deep breath in, removing the small piece of jewelry from the gun. She cautiously left it on her palm, studying it. The Caretaker-to-be slowly placed her weapon on the floor of the cherry picker.

The shock still written all across her frozen expression, she turned around to look at her partner. "Steve…" Before she could even think of something else to say, she noticed that he had already knelt down in front of her. He gently took the ring off her palm, smiling nervously. The redhead could see that his hands were shaking a bit, and he could see that she could barely even breathe right now.

This was the moment he was afraid of all along. Even though he knew that she loved him, he hoped this wouldn't all be too soon for her. Claudia wasn't exactly a marriage person after all. But now, there was no way back. All in, everything or nothing. There were so many words on the tip of his tongue, so much he wanted to tell her. But he couldn't say more out loud than the one question that was plaguing him all night.

"Claudia Donovan, will you marry me?"

It felt like both of their hearts skipped a beat. He had known that they would be here today. She had known what his question would be. And still, they both had problems to breathe at all.

Unable to say anything, the redhead decided to show him her answer another way. She pulled him up towards her, silently enjoying the fact that, for once, she seemed taller than him for a split second. As soon as he was standing on his feet again, she reached up to kiss him.

Once they broke apart, she finally found her voice again. Claudia stayed as close as somehow possible to her fiancé, leaning into the embrace. Her lips just an inch away from his ear, she whispered quietly but clearly:

"There's nothing I'd rather do."