Disclaimer: I am so far from owning these characters that I may as well live on Pluto. Cassandra Clare would be the Sun in this particular situation.

Will stared at the words written on the page. They were written in handwriting that was undeniably his, but they were words he had never ever written before. Besides, even if he had written those words in a copy of A Tale of Two Cities, it was impossible for them to be so faded, or for the paper they were written on to be so old.

"This isn't possible," he said slowly. "I haven't written any such words in any book, and even if I had, how on earth would someone I hadn't even met before this week have them?"

"Will," Tessa said, tugging at his sleeve. She could hear the sound of footsteps in the hallway outside. "Will we have to leave. I know this is strange-"

"Strange?" Will repeated incredulously. He waved the page at her. "This is beyond strange Tess! He has my signature under a note in my handwriting that I haven't written, in a book that at maximum could only be 18 years old and yet looks as though it could have been inside this box for well over a century!"

"One century and thirty years to be precise," Jace said calmly from the doorway. He had entered soundlessly and stayed to watch what would happen. He had considered a few excuses, but none of them were really viable. Besides, everyone he cared about had agreed to explain what was going on. "Although I can't speak for how long it's been in the box."

Tessa jumped to her feet with a guilty expression on her face. "We were- we were just-"

Jace looked at her with raised eyebrows. "Snooping through my personal possessions?" he suggested. "Or would you prefer spying? Either way it entails the same thing." He pushed off of the door frame where he had been leaning and allowed the door to slam shut. He moved easily over to his bed and flopped back on it carelessly.

Both Tessa and Will were silent for a moment as they tried to make sense of Jace's reaction.

Upon not hearing any movement Jace cracked open an eyelid. When he saw both Brits staring at him he opened his eyes again and sat back up. "What are you waiting for? While you're here you might as well get a look at everything. Let me know what you think of the letters written by my dead father. Oh , and hey! While you're at it, take the time to study my complete family tree!" He flopped back on the bed. "I'm not stopping you."

"Tessa," Will said in a voice of controlled calm. "Go to the training room so Gideon and Gabriel don't come looking for you. I'll come meet you as soon as I've had a chance to talk with Jace."

Jace sighed slightly as he heard the sound of Tessa's feet moving across the floor and out the door. "Does your version of talk involve physical violence? Because I'm going to need at least a ten minute power nap before hand."

"My version of talking involves you giving me an explanation of what in the hottest flames of hell is going on!" Will said forcefully.

"Look at the family tree," Jace said tiredly, pulling the pillow over his head. "It's the folded piece of paper," he described, his voice sounding muffled. "I'll explain more when I hear your exclamations of surprise."

Seeing nothing else to do, Jace unfolded the yellowed piece of parchment. It was entitled, Herondale Family Tree. "Why do you have a copy of my family tree?" Will asked immediately.

Jace pushed the pillow off of his head and held up a hand to stop further inquires. The combination of his insomnia and dealing with the time differences in England, plus the added stress of the situation with Mortmain, had left him exhausted, and for lack of a better adjective, cranky. "Explanations to come after exclamations of shock and surprise," he reiterated.

Will glanced back down at the family tree. There was a version of the Herondale family tree on the wall of his childhood home in Wales, so regardless of everything else going on he expected it to look the same. That would have meant that he and Cecily would be at the bottom with their dates of birth. He was shocked to find that instead it showed he and Cecily at almost the top of the paper. His mouth dropped open. The paper showed a date of birth, date of death, and even more disturbingly a line marking marriage to-"

Jace took the harsh gagging sound coming from Will's throat to mean he had found the bit that said he got married and had children. If someone had showed him documentation three months ago that he and Clary would end up married with two children and a whole pack of grandchildren he might have made a sound very similar to that one. "Look at the bottom of the paper before you put to much effort into breathing again. There's no need to go through that process twice."

Will looked down, already partially expecting what he would find. There at the bottom were the words Jonathan Christopher Herondale. 1991-. "How-" Will chocked out. "How is this possible?"

Jace sat up slowly to start his explanation. "It's not so incredible from my possession," he said. "To me it's just a record of time passing. To you it's got to be traumatic."

"But what- how?" Will tried to ask. He was having an incredibly hard time getting his head around this single proven piece of proven information.

Jace sighed. "This is going to sound so incredibly clichéd, but I'm from the future. Magnus Bane was trying to send me Clary, Alec, and Isabelle to England for a Clave meeting. Something went wrong. I also happen to be your great, great, great, great, grandson. Take a moment to breath and then come back to me with an actual pronounced question."

There were several minutes of silence before Will cleared his throat. After looking some more at the paper a few specific facts were popping out at him more and more. "I get married to and have kids with Tessa?"

"The paper doesn't lie," Jace said. "You marry Tessa and have two kids named James and Lucie. They get married to people and have kids. Their kids have kids and one of those kids has me. You should be happy, not everyone winds up with a descendant as amazingly physically capable, good looking, and intelligent as me."

At that moment Clary walked in. She took one look at the expression on Will's face and made a very accurate assessment of the situation. "You told him didn't you?" she stated to Jace.

"Yup," Jace said shifting sideways on the bed to make room for Clary.

She curled up next to him and leaned her head onto Jace's shoulder. "How long has it been since he stopped breathing?"

"Only about half a minute," Jace said innocently, kissing her on the forehead in hello. "I walked in on Will and Tessa looking through my things. I thought now was as good a time to explain things as any."

Clary nodded and looked over at Will. "You might want to sit down," she suggested. "You just found out some pretty major information about your personal future. You might also want some water, or maybe tea," she looked up at Jace. "Don't the British like tea in times like this?"

"I don't know," Jace said sarcastically. "Let me just go ask one of the other people out of the hundreds we know who have found out in the space of about five minutes that his great, great, great, great, grandson has come back in time to his present. I'll be back in ten minutes."

Clary elbowed him in the stomach. "Shut up," she turned to Will who had sunk down in to an arm chair. "Are you having trouble breathing?" she asked him kindly.

Will shook his head and looked at her more carefully. "You're not-" he started. "You're not related to me too are you?"

Clary shuddered. "Dear God no. The two of us already had to deal with that. I'm a Fairchild, or maybe a Morgenstern, but I'd rather not think about it that way. Either way don't sweat it."

"Alright," Will said nodding.

"Alec and Isabelle are a different story," Jace commented. He re-focused on Will. "Congratulations Billy Boy. You are not only a great, great, great, great, grandfather. You're also a great, great, great, great, granduncle."

Will dropped his head forward onto his hands. "Oh my God. Cecily has children."

"Maybe we could have waited to drop that bombshell," Clary commented to Jace.

The blond shrugged. "I thought it might be better to just drop everything at once. There's not really any point to prolong the inevitable. 'You can cut all the flowers but you cannot keep Spring from coming,'" he quoted. "That's a quote by Pablo Neruda."

Clary rolled her eyes. "You know your not the only one who can quote things. Try this one, 'Just because an apple falls one hundred times out of a hundred does not mean it will fall on the hundred and first.'"

Jace grinned crookidly. "The Death Bringer by Derek Landy," he acknowledged. "Well done My Lovely Ginger."

Clary looked at him skeptically. "Lovely Ginger?"

"What?" Jace frowned. "No good?"

"Don't ever call me that again."

He smiled again. "Alright Beautiful Red Head. Is that any better."

"That's a little bit better," Clary acknowledged. "Still not really there yet though."

"I'll keep trying," Jace promised.

Clary rolled her eyes. "If you are so determined to give me a nickname why don't you just call me Clare? Or Lyly? My mom used to call me that when I was little."

Will brought his head back up. "You all belong in an insane asylum but nothing else makes anymore sense then your story. So, when you go to the asylum please inform me because I believe I may come with you."

"So you believe us?" Clary checked.

"It seems I have no other option," Will said heavily.

"Excellent!" Jace said, getting to his feet. "I hope that means you'll help us convince Henry to help us get back to our own century. The Magnus Bane you know has agreed to help us if we can locate the schematics for a Portal."

Will nodded mutely.

Clary stood up and took Jace's hand. "I think we should get to the training room. Tessa will probably want to know what's been going on."

"Very true," Jace agreed. "We should also probably get there soon if we want to properly infuriate the Lightwoods today."

"I'm not sure I have the energy right now," Will said. He looked paler than normal, and like he might possibly be going into shock.

Jace walked over to Will and grabbed his shoulder. he pulled him up out of the chair. "Come on William," he cajoled as he led the boy towards the door. "We have an excellent opportunity to raise the blood pressure of one of the Lightwood family. I do it to Alec all the time."

"Alec and Isabelle are Lightwoods?" Will said. He sounded a little bit dizzy.

Jace clapped him on the shoulder. "Yup. Now let's go meet your future brother in law."

Will looked at him with some horror. "Please tell me you mean Gideon."

Clary and Jace exchanged looks that Will read correctly. His eyes filled with disbelief. "My baby sster gets married to and has children with Gabriel Lightwood!"

"Um..." Clary said. "Yes?"

"Right," Will said. he took one more wobbily step towards the door before his eyes rolled up into his head, and he collapsed onto the floor with a dull thud.

Clary and Jace just stared at him for a few minutes. "Well," Jace said into the silence. "I think that went pretty well don't you?"

A/N: So what did you think? I'm sorry things weren't incredibly exciting in this chapter, but I was aiming for plot development. I hope you liked the chapter, it's going to be the last one for a little while. I'm going to summer camp for a month and I'm not sure I'll be allowed to use the internet. I will continue it when I get back though! I promise! So don't flay me! Review for me!