Holidays! I'm celebrating my temporary freedom from school for almost two weeks. So here's an Easter present for you all.

The feedback was great guys, I really appreciate it!

Chapter Fourteen

As if filled by a plague of butterflies, Christina's stomach churned with the weight of her anxiety and she nervously ran a hand through dyed, cropped hair. This mission had seemed like it would be simple when she'd accepted it, though she'd had little choice in the matter. There had been no mention of the artefact breaking or any clue of how to activate it from the original model. What if it happened again on the next jump? There would be no going back then; they'd be stuck and it would be all her fault.

A moral dilemma was playing out in her head but she couldn't see any alternative. It was live or die, and she very much wanted to live. She wanted her parents to be happy and her siblings to exist alongside her.

As her plane touched down in South Dakota, she calculated that the agents she'd left unconscious back in LA would be starting to wake up soon. Her window of opportunity was becoming smaller by the second. How long would it take them to track her back to her hotel room? They had somehow discovered her preferred exit from the props warehouse, so they had to have a way to follow her trail. How long before they traced her call to the airport and found her flight and false credentials? How long before they then linked her name to the courier who Steve had briefly met the day before? How long before her mother put all these clues together and extrapolated her plan? How was she to get to her Mama before all of that happened?

With fake accent back in place, she breezed through customs with her carry on bag and hailed a cab the second she stepped out into the bitter, winter pre-dawn. She promised to pay the driver twice his fee if he could get her to the tiny town of Univille in under an hour, and then sat back and tried to relax as her mind formulated plan after plan, each contingency setting those butterflies flapping again.

Expecting to see at least a pillow beside him, Pete struggled to make sense of the stiffness in his neck, the cold, hard surface beneath him and the dusty plane stretching before his gaze. With a groan, he began to sit up and take stock.

"Oh crappy-crap," he muttered as his brain caught up with his memory of the early morning wake-up call and what he was seeing now. "Myka is so gonna kill me."

It took some time, first for him to find Agents Jinks and Wells, and then to wake them up. He recalled the sudden shocks that had put him out cold and asked the others if the same had happened to them.

"HG gave her a good fight, but she came at me like something out of the Matrix, running along the walls and leaping all over the place." They were all feeling the shame of having been bested by the young thief, but as the last line of defence, Steve was struggling to find his calm centre. "I'm not sure I really stood a chance," he admitted quietly.

"Regardless of how ineffective our resistance may have been, the bottom line is, she has what she came for and could quite possibly be anywhere, in any time right at this moment." She checked her watch and quickly calculated how long they'd been inactive. "She has a four hour head start on us. Fortunately, that means if we work quickly, we should be able to see her activities using the durational spectrometer, without needing my adaptations."

"Whoa! Hold the phone," Pete stepped into HG's path, his brow furrowed. "Any time? Are you telling me that she made an artefact out of the time machine?"

Recalling the moment with clarity, the inventor pictured the sparks and felt the breathlessness that had given her pause. Somehow, the act of touching the broken piece of the time machine had triggered a significant event and created an artefact. It was a fascinating yet unnerving experience to remember.

"Yes, Pete. She succeeded in activating an artefact and as of yet, we do not know her intentions. We must waste no more time and follow her trail." Agent Wells side-stepped the bulky man and returned to where they'd concealed their equipment.

"One of us should call Artie," Steve reminded them as HG set to work with the durational spectrometer.

Pausing, the inventor nodded in agreement, her expression pulling together in annoyance. "Would you be a dear and do the honours?" She asked the calm blonde, her tone full of sympathy for the young man. "I do not believe I can remain polite with that man after last night and we don't have time to start a debate."

"I'll do it," Pete announced before Steve could accept or refuse the request. "He's always annoyed with me, so I never notice the difference." He pulled out the Farnsworth and opened its cover before calling the Warehouse director.

Agent Jinks joined Helena as she replayed the events they'd all experienced four hours ago. It was strange seeing themselves tangle with the young thief and both were suitably impressed by her skills.

"She was professionally trained," HG observed. "I recognise most of her style. Some of it relies heavily on kenpo and her footwork suggests knowledge of dance or fencing." It was almost like watching someone she used to know, there was a feeling of familiarity but as much as she wracked her brain, she couldn't put a name to the person who had bested three Warehouse agents. Helena recalled the conversation she'd had with Myka before falling asleep the night before. The dancing, the fencing, the kenpo... Knowledge of artefacts... The Warehouse helping... Could it be...? Was some future event going to prompt her child to do what she'd never succeeded at? She heard Myka's voice telling her not to jump to conclusions but couldn't ignore the feeling in her gut.

She and Steve watched the figure as she leapt over his head and rendered him unconscious. Helena looked to see guilt on his face again and placed a hand over his upper arm. "She had the advantage in more ways than one. There was very little you could do to stop her."

Slowly, he nodded and thanked her. "I suppose we are further than we've ever got before. This should let us follow her wherever she's gone." He was holding the durational spectrometer now, pointing it at the image of himself paused while falling to the ground. He moved to play the image again but stopped when Pete called him over.

Helena accepted the device and felt agent Lattimer join her. She rewound, giving herself chance to see the young woman in action again and allowing Pete to see it with his own eyes.

"Capering Catwoman, that girl can move!" Pete followed the figure as she leapt over Steve again and paused as he dropped to the floor. In his excitement, he snatched the item from HG's hands and rewound again. "Do we know how she knocked us out?"

"No. Whatever she used as the delivery method, it had to be small enough to conceal during the fight but accessible enough use at will," the inventor explained as patiently as she could manage.

"Well, I'm just glad we woke up here and not at some fancy holiday resort." As his brain caught up with his mouth, he frowned. "Well... That actually sounds really nice and all, but you get what I mean, right? I don't prefer hard floors to exotic beaches or anything."

"We both would prefer to spend time with our partners, no matter the location. I understand. Could we perhaps continue with the investigation?" She nodded to the equipment he'd taken from her and watched as he sheepishly put it back in motion.

Though the woman's face was still covered, Helena could see the conflict in her stance. She saw the fabric around her mouth move as she spoke to herself in the dark and couldn't help but feel that there had been regret in those words.

Steve returned and they agreed to follow the trail before they passed the five-hour window and had to resort back to the blue glasses. Outside, they found where their escapee climbed over the wall, but rather than draw attention to themselves by scrambling over too, they returned to the gate guard and informed him that another of his colleagues had gone missing and that they were tracking a suspect.

Finding the right spot on the other side of the wall, they watched as she slunk back into the shadows for a moment and emerged sans mask and with her top inside out, so she merely looked like she might be out for a night on the town.

"She's just a kid," Steve commented quietly and saw the same awe he felt mirrored on his colleagues' faces. "I saw her in the warehouse earlier, talking to Mr. Evans. I think she works for him, though I'm fairly certain that her accent was English."

They exchanged concerns that their suspect had been aware of their presence all day, but continued to follow for now, each of them keeping watch on their surroundings in case a passerby happened to spot what they were doing.

Thankfully, without incident, they soon found themselves at a hotel. The sleepy desk clerk seemed reluctant to help them at first, but after a few choice words from Helena, he quickly identified their suspect and showed them the register for all guests.

"Helen Faucit; she's been here about a month. Always pays on time. Friendly sort, but she's never with anyone. Said she was here on business. Life or death apparently," he laughed, but saw that the agents barely cracked a smile. "I assumed she was joking. You don't think she was here to... y'know..." He dragged a finger across his throat with an appropriate sound effect, "Kill someone?"

Steve expected HG to jump in with reassurances as she had taken the lead with the questioning, but when he glanced at her, she appeared to be lost in her thoughts as she stared at the name in the register. "Er, no," he said quickly, his friendly smile covering his hesitation. "This isn't a murder investigation. But it is important that we find her. Is she still around?"

"Sorry buddy, she checked out a few hours ago. I've been on the desk all night. Saw her go out, she said she was going to check out a new club. Thought she must have had an argument with someone 'cause when she came back she seemed a bit shook up." His gaze drifted off a little as he remembered wishing that she had wanted to talk to him. She might have said yes to coffee or dinner if he could have kept her talking long enough. "She said she was checking out and needed to call the airport to book a flight."

Pete felt a twinge within his vibe and his wandering gaze fell back on the clerk. "Did you catch where she was going?"

"Sure. I remember thinking 'what the heck is in South Dakota?'" He chuckled again, thinking that they had to find that funny at least, but if possible the agents' faces were even stonier. "Er, she booked a flight that should have left at 3am, I think."

"I want her room key," the inventor demanded as she turned away from the desk, Farnsworth in hand and already calling the Warehouse. There were too many coincidences to ignore, but she had to be sure before telling the others. As soon as possible, she had to call Myka.

Propelling her chair across the office floor, Claudia braced for impact and deliberately ignored the hard stare that the director aimed at her. They were finally getting somewhere and she knew that her boss would quickly forget about misuse of office furniture once he heard her report.

"She's coming here," the redhead announced excitedly. "They tracked her to a hotel a couple of blocks north of downtown Hollywood. She's gone now but they managed to get a name and a positive ID from the guy at the desk. She left on a redeye flight from LAX at 3, so she should have touched down here around 7, local time."

"Get them back here. I want them on the next flight!" Artie growled at her, all patience with this suspect lost. He felt for sure that he was being played by someone, but wasn't sure who, yet.

Continuing to ignore his mood, the young techie swivelled on her chair and launched herself back to her own station. "Already booked," she responded smugly. "They can pick their tickets up as soon as they're ready. Flight leaves in two hours."

"Right... well, good then," he muttered, having nothing else to throw at her, almost wishing that Pete was around to have someone he could legitimately shout at.

Being stonewalled by the Regents and Mrs. Fredrick had put him in a permanent bad mood. He hated being kept out of the loop, and whenever his superiors decided to be tight-lipped, he was guaranteed to have a mess to clean up in the aftermath. Claudia's confession of her feelings from the Warehouse only confirmed this.

Grumbling to himself as Claudia called Myka to fill her in, Artie jabbed away at his keyboard and recalled the conversation he'd tried to have with Mrs. Fredrick the day before.

"We both know the Regents are withholding something," he insisted as the caretaker sat primly in front of his desk, her purse held habitually on her knee.

Irene's eyebrows twitched ever so slightly. "You know as well as I do, Arthur, that the Regents have their reasons for withholding information. If they know something about this case, then we will too, in good time."

"And the Warehouse?" he continued, desperate to get something out of her. "Claudia seems to think that our culprit is somehow linked with it, that it 'likes' her."

"A rare occurrence, but not unheard of. I'm glad to hear that we are learning more about her." She cocked her head to the side and a hint of a smile played around her mouth. "Agent Wells' influence?"

Despite his best efforts, he had not learned anything useful from her visit and was left with a reminder not to let his agents drag their feet with this case, especially as their suspect was now close by. His new recruits were on high alert and feeling the full force of his irritation.

Across the room, Claudia continued to keep an eye on her surveillance programme while simultaneously blocking out the sound of grinding teeth and reassuring Myka that HG was ok.

So far, all she had managed to get across was that the whole team had been rendered unconscious for approximately four hours.

"How did they lose consciousness? Are they injured? Have they been to a hospital?" Myka was pacing the length of the kitchen as she pictured her lover being hit over the head and let her imagination run away with concussions and haematomas. "God, I knew something had happened. I woke up a couple of times in the night and couldn't feel her."

"Well, yeah Mykes. Kinda hard to touch someone when they're a couple o'thousand miles away."

"No, I mean..." Pausing, the brunette realised that Claudia didn't have the finer details of her engagement ring's powers. "Never mind. I'll explain later. Tell me everything you know about last night."

Knowing that her fellow Warehouse grunt was not in the mood for a segway, the redhead relayed the most important details from HG's report, including her apologies for not being able to tell Myka herself and a promise to call, to talk privately before they boarded their plane home.

"What did you say that name was again?" the senior agent asked once the future caretaker was finished with her report.

"Helen Faucit," Claudia repeated. "Do you know it?"

The name felt familiar which was why she'd asked the young techie to repeat it but no faces came to mind. "I feel like I should but I've got nothing. So, this Helen Faucit has an artefact that could be capable of time travel, she's in South Dakota and we have no idea what she wants?"

"When you put it like that it doesn't sound like much, but it's a lot more than we had and at least she's no longer at risk of running into paparazzi on every corner." Claudia tried to optimistic, not wanting to study the sense of guilt she felt through her connection to the Warehouse. "King Arthur is mobilising all his knights to be aware of any crazy happenings in the area, and I've got every piece of recognition software watching all the local CCTV for anyone matching the ID we got from the hotel lobby camera. We'll get her, Myka."

She heard the comfort and forced confidence in Claudia's tone but didn't feel the intended effect. There were too many holes in this case and too many coincidences. She longed to speak to Helena but knew that she would only be doing so for her own peace of mind, to hear her voice. If her fiancée wanted to speak to her in private, she probably had something on her mind that she didn't want the others to know just yet. Myka thought back to the suspicion they'd shared the night before.

After arranging to catch up with Claudia again later in the day, Myka closed her Farnsworth and went to see if her daughter was up yet. Having been woken early by her bladder and unable to get back to sleep, she'd decided to check in with the Warehouse and was glad she had in light of what she'd learnt.

Deciding that she didn't really want to wait around for too long, she gently opened Christina's bedroom door and smiled down as sleepy eyes opened. Perching on the edge of the bed, Myka stroked mused hair out of the girl's eyes. "Good morning sleepy-head. Do you feel up to making an early start?"

Blinking against the morning sun streaming through her window, the eight-year-old yawned and sat up, rubbing the sleep from her eyes. "Ok," she responded without really thinking, just trusting her Mama to have a good reason.

Myka helped the still swaying girl to choose her outfit for the day and laughed with her as she wobbled around on one foot while trying to pull her thick winter tights on. She tugged her daughter's favourite explorer rucksack from under the bed and found room for an extra pair of tights, in case they ventured out in the snow for too long, and the inherited teddy bear that she took everywhere.

With snow still thick upon the ground, the pair trod carefully on their short journey to the bed and breakfast, both wrapped up snugly in winter gear though their destination was barely a hundred yards down the road.

Once inside the agent abode, Christina hurried to hang her coat and bag up, threw her hat and scarf in the same general direction before catching Myka's stern look, and huffed to herself as she picked them up and shoved them in the front pocket of her bag.

While the impatient youngster darted off to the kitchen in search of Leena, Myka turned towards the dining room and found the two new agents at the table, arguing in quiet tones.

"Damn it, you should be taking this seriously!" said a tight male voice in a harsh whisper. "We're hardly in a position to be slacking off. As new recruits, we should be proving our worth."

Opposite him, a stocky blonde woman slouched, seemingly without a care in the world. "It's all good dude. Let the egg heads play with the data. Mrs. F recruited me for my mad skills and it ain't got nothin' to do with readin' all this shit."

"You are possibly the most annoying person I've ever... oh!" At the sight of Myka entering the room, the irritated young man snapped to attention, standing to greet his superior. "Agent Bering. Ma'am, we were just reading through the case files while waiting for Agent Donovan to locate your suspect."

"This isn't a spot check, Jason, relax." Myka smiled at his awkwardness as he blushed and sat down. He was skinny and generally small, almost an inch shorter than herself, but she'd seen him training and when focussed, he had a sixth sense that allowed him to anticipate danger a split second before it happened. He was also a bit of a history buff, his field of study being archaeology. She could see why he was a potential asset to the team, though for now he was still very green.

Leaning back in her chair, teetering on the edge of falling, the twenty-something-old blonde surveyed Myka like they'd been friends for years. "What'd I tell ya? Yo, Mykes..."

"It's Myka, Agent Coombs, or Agent Bering. We haven't known each other long enough for you to call me anything but my name." This undisciplined layabout though was not what she had expected from one of Mrs. Fredrick's finds, Myka thought. She reminded the seasoned agent of Pete though, which was probably how she was able to keep her patience, for now.

"A'aight, Jeese. You two are a bucket of laughs ain't ya. What-evs."Letting her chair fall back into place with a jarring crack, she leant forward, arms sprawled across the table. "So this chick like really has a time machine? What is it with you people and time travel? First, your English babe is like the inventor of time or whatever, now we're lookin' for some girl who just made an artefact? You guys ever watch that flick about the hot tub?"

Fighting the urge to roll her eyes or say something really unprofessional, Myka tried to steer the subject back to their current issue. "Did Claudia send you a picture of our suspect?"

"Yeah, Little Red pushed it straight to my phone almost as soon as she had it. What of it?" Coombs smirked at the twitch at the uptight agent's jaw as if she knew how much her attitude was annoying her colleagues and was enjoying the effect.

"I think we need a pair of eyes in town." Agent Bering's eyes narrowed at the back and forth lack of respect but still refrained from voicing her irritation. Still, she could get rid of the source for a while. "Since you apparently are not interested in paper work, I thought it would be right up your street."

Shrugging, Coombs looked at the piles of paper work and felt a sense of relief. "Sure, fine by me boss. I'm up for takin' a stroll. Might get myself something real for breakfast while I'm at it."

Once they were alone, Jason sighed and flopped slightly in his chair. "Wish I could get her to leave like that," he mumbled to himself and then seemed to remember who he was with and tensed again. "Sorry ma'am."

Agent Bering smiled, remembering how little she had wanted to spend her free time with Pete in the beginning. "It's fine. I'm sure you'll find some way to get along, just give it time, and it's Myka, Agent Wickes."

"Yes ma'am, I mean... Myka." He blushed again and sat up straighter, gazing at the lanky brunette expectantly, waiting for orders.

Hesitantly, Myka reached for a file, breaking the intense stare. Her experience with attraction was fairly limited; it had taken the vocal equivalent of a sledge-hammer to make her aware of Sam's interest, and her first intimate interactions with Helena hadn't been much better, but something in Jason's sparkling eyes gave her pause. As the moment passed she shook her head, don't be ridiculous Myka, she chastised herself before refocusing her attention.

Ok, don't lynch me. I swear I won't make Myka do anything gross!