Title: Delivered
Author: A. Windsor
Fandom: Warehouse 13
Characters: Myka Bering, HG Wells, Pete Lattimer, with supporting roles from everyone else.
Pairings: Myka/HG, Claudia/Leena if you're inclined to see it.
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: All television shows, movies, books, and other copyrighted material referred to in this work, and the characters, settings, and events thereof, are the properties of their respective owners. My two years of law school could allow me to legalese this a little more, but it also tells me it's pretty useless. So please don't sue; it's not mine, I'm just playing!
Summary: "I didn't sign up for the Warehouse to mess with us like this."
Author's Note: Beta'd by cacheese, 'cause roughian's still catching up. I think we're coming towards the end (of this particular fic). There should be three or four more chapters, and then the many sequels and one shots this story has already spawned. For those who read my other fic, yes, it's officially a 'verse.
"How are you holding up?" Pete asks, sitting on the back porch bench beside her and extending a plate of cookies he knows she will decline.
"She was amazing with him," Myka says softly.
"So I hear. Claud says he really took to her, too."
At the mention of his son, Pete looks over his shoulder, through the window to catch a glimpse of Max. Steve has him on the living room floor, bravely playing a game involving multicolored shapes and a hammer.
"Yeah. It was... More than I could have dreamed of. Which is probably why it didn't last."
"Baby steps, Mykes. You've known that for awhile. She'll be back before you know it," Pete soothes, munching on a cookie.
"I feel selfish, though. For even asking. For demanding, really."
"HG's just as stubborn as you are I really doubt she would be doing this if she didn't want."
"Mmm," Myka barely cracks a smile.
"You are allowed to be happy, Myka. You're allowed to ask to be happy."
"Thanks, Pete."
"No problem," he kisses her cheek. "But next time? You're going to Nebraska."
"The dreams will never go away," HG says.
"Maybe not," Dr. Zhang agrees.
"It wasn't even a particularly bad one."
"You relived your daughter's murder, HG. That's not mild."
"I don't need to dream to do that," she counters. "Merely close my eyes."
"So why did you leave?"
"The dreams are unsettling. As is the pain it causes Myka."
"I see."
"She believes it is her fault that I am in this situation. Any slip of my resolve and her guilt..."
"Have you spoken to her about this?"
HG grins wryly, "Talking is not our strongest point."
"I think you speak well. And often," Dr. Zhang teases, before continuing seriously. "Talking is very important in a relationship."
"Yes, well," HG throws Dr. Zhang her flippant, charming smile. "Never really had one of those before."
Dr. Zhang smiles.
"Before the dream, how was your visit? How did you feel about spending time with all of them? With Max?"
"Wonderful," Helena admits easily. "He reminds me of Christina in the best way. I felt closer to her than I have in a very long time, and to her, the memories of her life. But with those memories, the rest of the past is closer as well. It was tiring, keeping them at bay. Until I couldn't any longer."
Dr. Zhang nods. "And why keep them at bay? Why not let them come as they may? Step through them. And share them."
"With whom?"
"Whomever. But I meant particularly Myka. How much have you told her about Christina?"
"Bit and pieces."
"Good or bad?"
"Mostly good, beyond the basics."
"Hmm. She needs to see all of you. The darkest part, too."
"She's seen that. She was at the barrel of my gun in Yellowstone."
"But does she know how you got there?"
"How is Max today?" Helena asks over their first normal daily phone call/Skype call since she left the inn. She called to report her safe arrival the morning she left, but the next day, Myka had been pulled away on a particularly messy artifact retrieval with Claudia for two days, unable to talk for more than a few minutes at a time.
"He's good. He's here, investigating my room while Pete takes a shower power hour," Myka rolls her eyes, then says more seriously: "We miss you."
"And I miss you. Both of you. May I see him?"
"Oh!" Myka grins. "Sure. Max, c'mere, buddy." She turns the computer so that the camera faces the boy as he toddles over to her. "Say hi to HG."
"He is wearing a bowtie," Helena laughs. "Did Claudia dress him today?"
"Pete," Myka shakes her head. "Claudia downloaded all of Dr. Who for him. So Max has been wearing a bowtie over his onesie all day. I objected. I was overruled."
"Our poor Max," Helena says. "You look dashing, love."
"Say thanks, Max."
He waves instead, then wanders off. Myka turns the computer back face her, watching Max from the corner of her eye.
"I think I shall return tomorrow evening, if that's alright."
"Really?" Myka asks, heart jumping.
"Yes. And I though this time I would perhaps bring a few of my very few things and leave them in your room, if you are amenable."
"Our room," Myka corrects forcefully and beams.
"I'd like that. Not sure how long I can stay, as I have been given a Regents assignment that must be handled by the end of the week. Perhaps I'll bring Claudia."
"She'd love that," Myka promises.
"Excellent. I'll let you know once the arrangements are made."
"Great. Oh, hold on a sec."
Myka puts down the computer and pulls Max onto the bed from where he stands whining at the end of the bed. She settles him into her lap, and he focuses instantly on the computer screen this time.
"Hello again, Max. Tell me: what would you like for your birthday?"
"Hey, what's that?" Pete asks as he notices Claudia whip out her phone at the breakfast table and just as quickly hide it away. Myka and HG's laughter is still echoing from behind them as they head to the kitchen.
"Nothing."
"Nope. I've got Dad-eyes now," Pete counters, ducking as Max decides today's fun game is to attempt to climb up his daddy's side. "Careful, little dude."
"Da-da," Max giggles as Pete guides him on the course.
"Fine," Claudia capitulates easily. "I've been keeping a tally."
"Of what?"
"How many days of the last fifteen HG has woken up here."
"Are you counting your completely awesome, completely unfair trip to Rio?"
"Yes," Claudia gloats.
"So how many? And why?"
"Nine. And trying to figure out what percentage counts as actually living here."
Pete chuckles.
"What? I just want the whole family together again, okay?"
"You and everyone else, Claud. Nine seems like a good percentage. Plus, everyone will be here tomorrow. It's the party!"
"True, true," Claudia grins, grabbing Max from Pete's shoulder. "How's it feel to be almost one, Max?"
"I want to take you somewhere."
"In Univille?"
"In the Warehouse," HG smiles, threading her fingers through Myka's and leading her out of the office. "Mostly."
Her fingers fly nimbly over the console, and with a clanking thud, an old, solid door is thrown into place.
"Warehouse 12 had a Leena's, too, you know. A boarding house actually, rather than an inn." Helena's hand pauses on the door knob. "I, of course, had my home, with Charles and Christina, so I didn't live there until... Well, until the end. As the madness consumed me, I spent more and more time locked away in there."
"Helena," Myka has already caught on, hand closing warmly on her upper arm, pressing in tight against her. "We don't have to do this."
"We do, darling. And I need you to not be afraid to go there with me."
"Okay," Myka acquiesces, squeezing her arm. "Okay. Whatever you need."
"You saw the climax, out in Yellowstone, but I need you to see how I got there. So that you what I left behind. What festered in me for a century. Before you absolved me of it."
"You absolved yourself," Myka argues. "You stopped that day."
"Because you stopped me."
"Because I knew you wanted me to," Myka ripostes, earning a soft smile.
"Yes, well, no one knows me better." Helena takes a deep breath and opens the door. "That is why I need you to know this version as well. "
At first glance, the small room does not look much different from Helena's other workspaces: schematics are strewn about and hanging from every surface rather haphazardly. But Helena is usually the epitome of ordered chaos, with strong patterns emerging easily to the genius (or the one who knows her best).
There is no order here.
Helena's usually deliberate penmanship, even in haste, is here barely legible scrawl, random words underlined, emphasized to the point of tearing the paper with the pen.
The schematics themselves are also different, Myka notes as she wanders about to take a closer look. While Helena's inventions are always fantastical, she usually ties them into reality. These were machines, many weapons, that simply could not function (and to say that about the fruits of HG Wells's mind, she who rewrote the laws of physics on a regular basis, bears special weight).
On the nightstand of the hastily made bed is a framed picture of Christina, at a younger age than the one in the locket. Myka picks it up tenderly, and the motion disturbs a sheet of paper, which flutters to the floor. Myka picks it up and reads aloud:
"E.M.? W.W.?"
Helena smiles tightly and slips the paper from her fingers.
"The agents who paid from my sins."
"How?"
"Edward, Ned, McShane. He was a brave agent, if a bit dour. He lost his life when I tried to incorporate an artifact into one of my more dangerous designs." Helena takes a deep breath, letting her thumb brush tenderly over the second set of initials. "William Wolcott. A dear, sweet man. Devoted agent and friend."
"The one who worked on Joshua's Trumpet with you," Myka says knowingly.
"Yes. I was - reckless, toward the end especially. I had nothing to live for. I was barely sleeping, barely eating. When I wasn't hunting artifacts, I was searching for any way to bend time. Caturanga somehow convinced the Regents that I could still handle the field, but after... "
"What happened?" Myka presses.
"We were tracking the arrow that slew Moctezuma. It was said to have imbued in it all of the rage and pain of the defeated Aztecs. One touch could incapacitate. To be stabbed with it was..."
"Fatal," Myka provides.
"Yes. I was supposed to be Wolcott's partner, to watch out for him. But of course I charged in blindly and he followed after and... He died the deaths of the entire Aztec Empire."
Helena closes her eyes, and they're glassy when she reopens them.
"Shortly thereafter, I chose the Bronzer as the... best of my options. The Regents were more than happy to oblige. I'd always been a thorn in their side."
"Your time machine," Myka says knowingly.
"I was blinded by my quest for a greater future. Even before Christina's death, perhaps. My ambition for knowledge and adventure kept me from her side, and then later, it also cost McShane and Wolcott their lives. I thought that if I could wake up in the future, the wonder would be enough to get rid of the hunger. And the centuries in Bronze would serve as the penance for my failings. I could be reborn in the future and live in a better world. And forget. "
"But you didn't forget."
"No. Instead, I lived Christina's death over and over, and my anger only grew. I was endlessly reminded of the injustices of my time. I ruminated on my failed attempts to manipulate time to my advantage. The hope of a new world was my only sliver of light in that infinite darkness, but when I awoke..."
"The world wasn't new."
"No. It appeared to have gotten worse."
Myka looks around. The signs of madness are everywhere, and this was before Helena spent over a hundred years with only her thoughts for company. She thinks back to Helena's eyes that day in Yellowstone. It wasn't rage. It wasn't hate. It was pain. HG Wells had always been striving to improve the world. To end the world's pain and give the world the new start she had dreamed of for a century in bronze.
"So you wanted to put the world out of its misery."
"Yes," Helena admits freely, then continues more sheepishly: "It made sense at the time."
Myka picks up Christina's picture again.
"We've never talked about Yellowstone before," she says softly.
"Yes, well, my previous apocalyptic tendencies are an uncomfortable subject. We also do not talk about my body count. The men who murdered Christina. MacPherson. Thought I still have very little guilt over those. Those boys in Egypt, over whom I have boundless remorse. Very nearly Pete."
"But you said you want me to know that version of you."
Helena steps in closer to Myka, one hand brushing delicately over her shoulder, the other resting lightly on the wrist of the hand that holds Christina's portrait. Myka shivers.
"You are my new start, Myka. The one I always dreamed of. You and this family. But I have learned, painfully, that you cannot erase the past. And so to have our now, you have to learn my then. We have to live with my then."
Myka turns, slowly, and pulls Helena into her embrace.
"If you do not want to, I understand -" Helena starts.
"Tell me everything," Myka demands, holding on tight. "I want to know all of it."
tbc