AN: Phryne's age was a problem for me. The books have her born in 1900, so she's 29 during the time period of this story. But the TV show, which is what this fic is based on, has Essie Davis in the role and she was 42 when the first episode aired. I went a bit younger than that, but definitely strayed from the book aging. This has her at 35 in 1929. This also keeps her right around Jack's age based on his comments that he went to war a newlywed and was married 16 years (Raisins and Almonds). Assume he was 20 or so when he married, he'd be about 38 by this story. If any of that math bothers you… well, tough, because it's my story and it works for me.
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Melbourne - June 24, 1929
"Henry."
"Hello, Phryne."
She couldn't believe her eyes, but she also couldn't deny what they were telling her. Standing before her was Henry Morgan, who she had last seen more than a decade earlier.
The worst part of war, Phryne had decided very early during her time in France, was the noise. The constant, unrelenting noise. She'd been stationed at many places with her ambulance unit since she had joined up in early 1914 - defying her mother's wishes to stay and help the war effort back home - but Verdun had been the worst so far. Even a mile back from the actual trenches, the noise was a surrounding force. It had already been four months of nearly unending mortar shelling and the kind of wounded soldiers that came with it. Four of the six months that she'd been stationed there the noise had been a constant backdrop to her life.
But there had been some good within the chaos and horror of the war as well.
For a start, she felt useful - something she hadn't felt since before she lost Janey - using the skills taught to her during her trauma control crash course to save lives. Or at the very least to give someone a little bit of comfort during their last minutes.
She'd also seen some amazing moments of human kindness amongst the insanity. Tired, hungry soldiers, many of them barely more than boys, who were having trouble keeping themselves together caring for lost and orphaned animals. Locals providing shelter and food when they themselves had so very little. Little things that kept her pushing forward through the moments when all she really wanted to do was curl up and cry for days.
And there was Henry. Charming, handsome, brilliant Henry, 15 years her senior, who had been in the trenches since the earliest moments of the war and who kept pushing everyday despite that. Or maybe because of it.
She'd met the doctor on her first day at Verdun, introduced to him along with the rest of the medical staff at their post within moments of arriving. She saved a life with him on her second day there, a young digger, so young infact that she had no doubt that he'd lied on his enlistment papers. If he was a day over 16 she'd have been shocked. They failed to save a life together on her fourth day and when they could do no more she held the soldier's hand in one of her own while reaching for Henry's arm with her other. And he had hugged her tight as she cried afterwards, told her that it was good after years of seeing soldiers die that she could still care, could still cry for them.
She spent her 15th night at Verdun in his bed and a good deal of the nights after as well. As an officer and head of the medical division, he had the benefit of his own room, separate from the chaos of the rest of the hospital station. She had watched him from across the rows of beds after a particularly bad day, one filled with death and loss. Had seen his shoulders hunched, his hands still covered in the blood of the dead, as he exited the hospital. She hadn't had a plan when she followed after him, invading his room without a care for the insubordination charges that might come down for it.
He had been cleaning up at the small basin in the corner and didn't immediately turn when she said his name. 'Henry' she'd whispered, not 'Dr. Morgan', the first time she'd used his given name. He dried his hands, set the towel back down, and paused for a long moment, his hands braced on the basin stand. Then he'd turned and moved decisively towards her. The rest of the night was a blur of hands and sighs and pleasure; a few hours without the noise and blood and fear of the front.
She wasn't a fool, even at 20. She knew that this wasn't love or forever or any of the things that the other nurses espoused of their own wartime lovers - for she was hardly unique in latching onto another person in the chaos - it was none of those things, but it was necessary. And she often found herself wondering if, when the war ended, when they went back to their lives, it could become all of those things. If they could go back to those lives together. But at that moment, at that place, it wasn't. It was release and relief and sanity.
For six months he was her sanity. Her rock after working 16 or 20 hours with little to no rest, sometimes so covered in blood by the end of it that she could barely peel herself out of her clothes. It spoke volumes that no one ever questioned the relationship, never mentioned, even in passing, when she exited the hospital to his quarters rather than her own bed.
There were plenty of jealous looks from the other nurses. That was to be expected. Henry was an extremely good looking man. He was kind and smart and, on the rare occasions when there was reason to exercise it, had a fantastic sense of humor. But even the jealous ones never said anything against it. It was an unspoken agreement on the front: you did what you did to get through each day, few to no questions asked.
On November 12, 1916, they had been visiting the trenches, performing basic first aid on various injuries not worthy of being sent behind the lines to the hospital station. They tried to do this every time the mortar shelling paused for even a hour or so, sending in teams of nurses and doctors as available to tend everything from trench foot to lice.
She and Henry had been working through a section of forward trenches occupied by relatively newly arrived British soldiers, bandaging minor cuts and dolling out dry socks, when the mortar shelling restarted. The noise had been deafening, so much worse than it was back at the hospital, and she had dropped her bag of supplies as she rushed to cover her ears. Henry quickly finished with the man whose barbed wire gash he'd been suturing and gestured for her to lead the way back to the rear trenches and the relative safety they provided.
She had turned and started to move, her hands still up over her ears and his hand on her back offering comfort and support, when an explosion had rocked the ground around her and Henry had been thrown into her back by the blast. She landed face first in the mud, his heavy weight half on her and it took her a long moment to realize why the world had suddenly gone silent save a steady ringing. Struggling against the mud and Henry, she'd managed to pull herself to a kneeling position and turn around. The devastation was worse than she could possibly have imagined possible.
The mortar shell had landed dead center at the far end of the trench segment and detonated, sending deadly shrapnel out in all directions, ripping apart earth, wood and flesh alike. Henry and her dash down the trench had brought them away from the worst of the blast. The men they had just been treating were all very obviously dead, most unidentifiable. She looked away, unable to handle the destruction before her. Her eyes landed on Henry and she let out a sharp cry that her still ringing ears couldn't hear.
He was lying on his stomach, face just barely out of the mud, his back a mess of torn cloth and blood. She realized in an instant what had happened. He'd been behind her when the blast hit, his body protecting hers from the shrapnel. It had torn through him instead. But he was still alive.
Even as she watched, he managed to turn himself onto his side and reach out a hand towards her. Holding in her sobs, she moved to his side, grasping his hand in one of her own and slowly stroking his hair with the other. She had seen enough of this kind of injury to know that he would not survive, all she could do was stay by his side while he died.
He tried to speak, but had barely opened his mouth when coughs wracked his body, blood flecking out from his lips with each hacking breath.
She wanted to tell him not to talk, but couldn't bring herself to stop any last words that he might have for her. Instead she made soothing noises, holding his shoulders until the coughing had subsided. She was glad to be able to hear her own voice in her ears, though the sound was muffled unnaturally and seemed far off. She chided herself for caring about that when a man she cared deeply for lay dying in front of her.
"Phryne." This time the word made it past his lips, though the effort it took appeared immense and set off another wave of heavy coughs. When he looked up at her again, there was blood seeping out of the corner of his mouth. She used the corner of her apron to wipe it off though it did little good, coated in mud as it was. She stroked his face with her hand, still murmuring the same soothing noises she'd used on a hundred dying men before him, desperately holding back her tears.
He spoke again, "I'm sorry."
She was about to reply, tell him he had nothing to be sorry for, when the coughing restarted. It stopped abruptly and this time he didn't look back up at her, his body completely still. Even before she set her hand against his neck, she knew. He was dead.
She let loose the tears she'd been holding back even as she tried to convince herself to get up, to return to the hospital, there was nothing more she could do here. Just as she was about to struggle to her feet and force herself away from him, the impossible happened. She was looking directly at his body when suddenly it was no longer there. Nothing else in the trench had changed, but the body of Henry Morgan had disappeared.
Forcing her mind back to the present and the impossible man standing before her, she tried to process what was happening. Despite what her memories were telling her, there was no mistaking the man that stood in front of her, saying her name in a voice laced heavily with guilt and looking like he had not aged a day in the years that had gone by.
For a brief moment she thought she might pass out, her vision greying a little at the edges before refocusing. Out of the corner of her eye, she noticed Jack stand and take a half step towards her, so the distress she was feeling must be evident on her face. She shook her head slightly, mostly to pull herself together, but also partially to hold off his approach and concern. It seemed to work, he stopped moving.
Henry didn't miss the non-verbal exchange. She wasn't surprised. He had so rarely missed anything about the people he interacted with. Had sometimes been able to read and understand her own emotions before she even had a handle on them. The remembrance finally shook her out of her silence and she spoke.
"This is impossible." Her voice wavered slightly over the words and she paused a moment to collect herself. When she continued on her voice was clear, though it still held an undertone of confusion which was rapidly turning to anger. "You… you died at Verdun. I saw it."
She wanted to say that she'd seen much more than just his death, but couldn't bring herself to accuse him of vanishing. Not in front of Jack. She knew how crazy she would sound. As it was she could see the horror that her statement had etched across his face and the guilt that was quickly overtaking it. For one insane moment she wanted to laugh at the blame she knew he was currently throwing at himself for bringing her face to face with such a dramatic part of her past. As if he could have known. But the burst of crazy mirth was short lived as Henry spoke, his voice exactly as she remembered it.
"Not impossible. Just… complicated" His eyes bore into hers and she knew that he wasn't talking about his death anymore than she had been. So she wasn't insane. The knowledge didn't comfort her the way she expected it to. She needed answers, real answers, and she knew she wasn't going to get them with Jack in the room.
She kept her eyes on Henry's face for a long moment, trying to find a way to frame her next request that wouldn't hurt Jack, but she couldn't find one. Taking a deep, steadying breath, she turned to face the Detective Inspector. He already knew what was coming, she could see the hurt and anger building in his expression, but she needed her answers. She would find a way to explain to him later, to make him understand.
"Jack," she tried to fill her voice with all of the respect and affection that she felt for him, looking him straight in the eye, hiding nothing of her own worry about this request, it's cause, and the toll it might take on them, "Could you please give us the room for just a few minutes?"
She watched as some of the anger receded from his expression, though the hurt stayed, as he read her tone and features. Jack Robinson, she thought to herself, the man who could read her better than anyone ever had. Even Henry had never really understood some of the things that he could see in her eyes. She had never told him of her sister or the extreme poverty of growing up the way she had. But Jack… he knew her, present and past. So, while it obviously hurt him to do so, she watched him clasp his lips tight and give her a curt nod before striding around his desk and past her. He didn't so much as glance at Henry as he went.
She watched him go, considered reaching out and brushing a hand against his as he left, but thought better of it. He shut the door behind him and Phryne stared at the wood panelling for a long moment before turning back to the office. After a moment's hesitation, she reversed Jack's path, walked around his desk, and took a seat in his chair. With a deep breath she made eye contact with Henry and spoke in a clipped tone.
"Explain."
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AN: Next chapter will have Henry explaining to Phryne about his existence and his familiarity with the Ripper cases and then chapter 9 will go back to the same time as the start of this chapter, but follow Jack's thoughts, so don't worry, I'm definitely going to go in depth on how Jack feels about this man of Phryne's.
