Quill:

When I woke up, I was lying on my side. Lucy was in my arms, front to front. Her face was buried in my chest.

I didn't dare move because I didn't want to disturb her. That, and I could be a selfish bastard sometimes and I wanted to extend the amount of time I had her in my arms as much as possible as I never expected to have this opportunity again.

Slowly, she came to. I felt her eyelashes flutter against my skin. For a long time, she didn't move either and I liked to delude myself into thinking that maybe her motivations for staying were the same as mine.

While I wished it could, the moment couldn't last forever.

I leaned back a bit to look at her properly. Her eyes were still red and swollen, but not nearly as much as I thought they would be. The blotchiness had calmed too. There was a red mark where the side of her face had been lying on my arm.

I wish I could see that mark every day, but that wasn't to be.

I moved her hair out of her face and tucked it behind her ear and I was struck by the thought of how unfair it was, to have her there and not be able to keep her, but I had learned early on that nothing in life was fair. I had to take what I could get and appreciate it as much as I could. Complaining would get me nowhere.

"Hi," I whispered when I realised I had been staring at her for longer than was probably warranted.

Her lip twitched in the ghost of a smile which I decided was quite a victory considering her emotional state yesterday. I had to tread carefully because even though my heart was full from having her in my arms, it didn't mean anything to her, other than comfort. I didn't want to take advantage of the situation even though it was so very, very tempting.

"Hi," she breathed.

I didn't know what else to say. Besides, I was too busy drowning in her to think properly.

Tears started to form in her eyes again and her face crumpled. She buried her face in my chest, shaking a bit with silent sobs.

"I'd like to know what happened, but maybe it's better if you had a good soak in the shower and I'll go make some breakfast and a strong cup of tea?"

She sniffled a bit and nodded but didn't move. I didn't either. I didn't quite know what to do so I simply squeezed her a bit tighter and stroked her hair.

In the end, nature decided for us.

"I need to pee," Lucy confessed, as if it was somehow a large defeat.

I chuckled a bit and kissed her forehead before letting her go. I found myself smiling when she went to my wardrobe and took one of my t-shirts without being prompted to do so.

She gave me a rueful smile over her shoulder before stepping out of the bedroom.

I let myself flop back on the bed and rubbed my face hard.

She's just here because something bad happened.

I took several deep breaths and tried to swallow the pain.

It was no use.

Instead, I went to the kitchen, intent on cooking up that breakfast I had promised.

I sighed again as I passed the bathroom door. The sound of the water splashing on the tiles from her shower sent pictures into my mind which were far from appropriate.

I shook my head to try to get rid of them and went to put the kettle on.

I had finished making coffee and was rummaging around for Lucy's favourite tea, which I completely coincidentally happened to have lying around, when I heard a knock on the door.

Foolishly thinking that it was Tony, coming to follow up on whatever had happened the day before, I opened the door.

I sighed heavily when I saw the nuisance on the other side. "What do you want?" I asked tiredly.

The twenty-year-old bane of my existence gave me an obnoxious smile. "What, I can't just come to say 'hi'?"

I crossed my arms in front of me and gave him a deadpan look. "Hi. Now, go away."

He gave me a smirk before pushing his way past me. I tried to block the door, but he had an ability to wiggle around me that had been honed through two decades.

"Look, this really isn't a good time, William," I groaned as he had forced himself into my hallway.

He snorted. "I'll bet." He waggled his eyebrows and tapped one of Lucy's boots which were still lying haphazardly on the floor.

"It's not what it looks like," I defended, raising my arms.

William rolled his eyes. "You mean they're yours? Relax. And put on a damn shirt." He wrinkled his nose at me.

"I'll ask again; what do you want? I really wasn't kidding when I said it wasn't a good time – no! no, no, no, don't you dare take your shoes off. You're not staying."

I put a hand on his chest to push him back.

He laughed. "What, are you ashamed of having a girlfriend?"

"She's not my girlfriend,"

"But you want her to be," he teased and took a step back, "and so it would be detrimental to your cause if she should meet the more handsome brother before you had a chance to seal the deal."

He ran a hand through his unfairly brown hair, smirked widely, and did that infuriating eyebrow waggle.

I sighed and made a snort. "She works with Tony. I actually think they might be seeing each other, so no chances there. She only came here because something bad happened to her friend, but I don't have the whole story. I do know, however, that it wouldn't be great to have you ogle her as soon as she gets out of the shower, so I would appreciate if we could move this along so you can get going."

He rolled his eyes again. "Fine. Mum wants you to sign some papers," he grumbled and fished a small stack out of his messenger bag.

I winced as I straightened them. "Aren't you supposed to have more respect for paperwork?"

He snorted. "What gives you that idea?"

"Aren't you studying law?" I asked him with a raised eyebrow.

He made a face at me. "If your eyesight ever gets worse, please wear contacts. I don't want to have one more dad."

I chuckled and pushed his face. He gave me a pen and I skimmed the papers before signing them against the wall.

"Here you go, you little shit," I said fondly as I pushed the papers into his hands, opened the door and pushed him out.

He stuck his sneaker clad foot in the way before I could shut the door.

"How much for not telling mum about finding a girl in your flat first thing in the morning?" He grinned widely.

"Bye, William," I sing-songed before kicking his foot out and slamming the door in his face.

I went back to the kitchen to finish up the breakfast.

"Who was it?"

I jumped as I hadn't noticed Lucy sitting in a chair at the kitchen table, wearing my t-shirt and nothing else. I assumed she was wearing underwear, but I had learned from experience that that wasn't necessarily a given. I felt my cheeks go warm.

I put a hand on my chest, and I noticed her trying to supress a smirk.

I gave her a wry smile. "It was my brother. Pray that you'll never have to meet him."

She snorted but didn't respond other than that.

I finished making the tea and put it down in front of her.

She grabbed my hand, stopping me from going to make breakfast.

"I don't feel like eating right now," she whispered. The short sleeves of my t-shirt revealed some angry looking bruises on her upper arm. They extended up under the sleeve. I expected it was part of the story.

I sighed. "You should eat," I told her gently and rubbed my thumb on the back of her hand. "Do you want to tell me about it?"

She nodded but didn't speak. Instead, she started trembling. I took her by the hand and pulled her with me, back into the bedroom where I wrapped us both in the comforter.

"What happened?" I prompted in a whisper.

"We came back," she started in a whisper before clearing her throat and speaking a bit more normally, if a bit shaky. "When we came home last night, Lockwood and me, Holly was there. Holly wasn't supposed to be there because it was her day off, but she was there anyways and then she told us – she told us that – she told us that George – George had been found."

She started crying and her voice became more unstable.

"They had beaten him," she sniffled. "They had beaten him just like Bunchurch, and just left him in the gutter."

"Is he alright?" I asked, more worried than I had expected to be.

She shook her head and she let out a single sob. I hugged her tight.

"Lockwood is at the hospital. I should probably get back soon in case he comes back. I just – I didn't want to be alone. Holly did want to stay, but I just – I wanted to come here," she confessed in a whisper, confusing the hell out of me. Why would she want that?

"You're always welcome here," I assured her with a kiss to her forehead. "If you want, we can go and we can buy something to eat on the way? Maybe buy for Tony and Holly too? I bet Tony hasn't eaten either."

I felt her smile slightly.

"I think that would be a great idea,"

…

Lucy:

This was a horrible idea.

When we came back to Portland Row, no one was home. Quill virtually forced me to eat a chocolate croissant that he had bought at a much too fancy bakery down the corner from where he lived. It was a shame because I was certain that it would've tasted great except that at the moment nothing tasted of anything. The lack of appetite meant that I had to force it down and it felt as if it stayed lodged in my throat.

Quill went around, tidying up. He seemed on edge. Every little movement was a bit brittle, and he kept sneaking glances at me, but he was still moving around with purpose. Then suddenly he would stop and stare; out the window at the apple tree, up the stairs towards Jessica's room or even at a small dent in the wall in the kitchen.

I couldn't imagine what was going on in his head. I knew I had been unfair to him. I should have stayed put here with Holly. I could see it in his eyes, how much I was hurting him, but I selfishly sought out his comfort.

The shame I felt about my treatment of Quill and pain I felt about the threat of losing George was only amplified by the harsh words whispered to me by James Rumsford.

Everything that happens from now on is your fault.

It should have been me in the hospital.

An hour after we arrived, I was pacing in the library. That didn't last long, as I remembered George doing the same just the other night, driving me bonkers.

I threw myself down on the sofa, trying to get my breathing under control.

I heard the door open and shut and it felt as if less than a second had passed before Holly was next to me, pressing a mug of tea in my hands and rubbing soothing circles on my back.

Quill was leaning against the doorframe, staring at us with a frown. It fell when he noticed me looking back at him and turned into a gentle smile.

"I was just at the hospital," Holly informed us, which immediately caught my attention.

"What's going on? What happened?" I asked.

My voice sounded small and broken. At any other time, I would have been angry with myself about that fact. I would have been ashamed of this fragility and tried to push it down as hard as possible.

At the moment though, I didn't give a shit. Because this was about George.

Stupid George, who happened to be a genius and one of the only and most stable constants in my life. No matter what happened, no matter if it was the bloody apocalypse, I'd had faith that George would be there in all his uncoordinated, dishevelled glory.

I knew he was important to me. Regardless of our rocky start, over the years, he had become family to me in a way none of my relatives had ever managed.

Holly took a deep breath. "They uh – after we left last night, they scanned him. There's some swelling to the brain, but there's – there's no bleeding."

"That's good, right?" I asked.

Quill nodded. "Is the swelling going down?" he asked softly and came to sit down on the coffee table.

"I don't know," Holly whispered.

"This is such a mess," I heard myself whimper.

Holly immediately took my hand. "We'll get through it, Lucy." She assured me.

"How is Tony?" Quill asked.

Holly winced. "He's not holding up too well."

"I'll go check on him."

"Please do," Holly begged, but Quill was already going to the kitchen, probably gathering food for Lockwood.

Holly cocked her head and looked at me.

"What happened to you?" she asked quietly.

I huffed. "George is in the hospital, that's what's happened," I snapped a bit.

"No, you were rattled already when you came through the door last night. And you and Lockwood seemed a bit out of sorts. And then there's that," she pointed at the bruise that was peeking out under the t-shirt sleeve.

I rubbed my face. Why the hell did Holly have to be so bloody observant?

"I feel so bad," I whispered. "Something happened at the function last night and it's led to this. George was attacked because of me."

Holly blinked several times. "How on earth did you reach that conclusion?"

I sighed. "It was that James Rumsford. He uh – he was there, and he wanted me to come with him. He got very angry when I didn't want to. I got help from some other people. But he said that whatever came next would be my fault. There's not a single ounce of me that doesn't believe that this is what he meant."

I looked away. I couldn't bear looking at her.

"Lucy Joan Carlyle!" she scolded, and I flinched, ducking my head.

She sighed softly. "Lucy," she tried again, gentler, but her voice shook. "I'm very cross with you right now."

"I'm sorry," I whispered.

She huffed a bit impatiently and then I suddenly found myself being shifted. How the little twig of a girl managed to lift me into her lap, I have no idea, but suddenly I found myself in her embrace.

"Don't you ever dare take responsibility for this. What those animals did is not your fault. Don't you dare put it on your own shoulders."

I don't know for how long we sat like that. I just know that at some point, I woke up on the sofa, covered by a blanket.

…

Quill:

I hated hospitals.

The very idea of people I cared about being hurt enough to warrant a visit here was killing me, and yes, bloody hell, I'd admit that I cared about Cubbins on some sort of level.

Despite my hatred of the buildings, I knew every hospital in the city quite well. It was impossible not to, as an agent and even harder as a supervisor.

Tony was easy enough to find. I had asked for Cubbins' room and there he was, sitting on a wooden chair outside it, looking like he might fall over at any minute. He was hunched over with his elbows on his knees, staring at his hands.

He was so stuck in his own head that he didn't even notice me passing him or bringing up another chair from the visitor's lounge to sit next to him.

It wasn't until I put the donut in his hand that he jumped like an alley cat in alarm.

I couldn't help the small snort.

"Jesus, Quill!" he hissed.

He looked terrible. His eyes were red and swollen from crying and lack of sleep. There was stubble on his jaw which I felt incredibly weird about since in my mind he was still so small he had to climb the countertop to reach the cabinets.

That wasn't right though. He was all grown up, but at the moment, he did look more like a little boy who had climbed to the very top of the tree only to realise that he couldn't get back down again.

It was that same mix of panic and shame of someone who had jumped in at the deep end and didn't know how to ask for help to save them from drowning.

He returned the donut and went back to staring at his hands which soon became wet with tears that fell from his chin.

"I messed up Quill," he whispered brokenly. "I messed up so bad,"

I put a hand on his back and rubbed it.

"However bad you've messed up, odds are that I've messed up worse at some point," I confessed.

He made a small, choked laugh. "That's not even funny."

"It wasn't supposed to be."

We fell silent, only interrupted by Tony's small sniffles as he tried to compose himself. I kept my hand on his back, to try and be there for him.

"I failed them," he admitted in a small voice after a while.

I pulled the thermos out of the bag I'd brought and poured him a generous cup of nice, hot tea.

I pushed it into his trembling hands, but he only stared at it as if it was a strange and foreign object.

"Don't make me force it in you," I threatened which made him to take a small sip.

I hadn't ever seen him that defeated.

"Tell me what happened," I prompted.

He rubbed his face, scratching a bit at the stubble.

"George, he – he went out last night. You know, for that stupid book. I should never have let him go alone."

"Knowing him, he insisted, and you couldn't have stopped him even if you tried."

He made a small, huffed laugh that sounded more like a scoff than anything.

"You know George better than you let on."

I shrugged. "I know how stubborn he is. How is he?"

"Black and blue but he'll live." He took a small sip of the tea. "I'm still worried though."

I sucked in a breath. "You think he might have brain damage? Holly said something about swelling."

"No. I'm worried that they might come to finish the job. That's why I'm staying here." He narrowed his eyes at a nurse who walked out of a room at the far end of the hall.

"You're a good friend," I told him softly. "They're lucky to have you."

He choked a sob and started shaking so I had to take the tea from him. He buried his face in his hands as he cried.

"Hey," I prompted gently, trying to rub his back a bit more. When that didn't help at all, I put my arm around him, twisting him around in a hug. He cried into my shoulder and I felt my own eyes warming with how reminiscent it was to when I had held him those years ago after I had found him with his sister's body in his arms.

"It's okay, Tony," I tried soothing. "I've got you. Deep breaths."

"I'm a horrible friend," he whispered into my shoulder.

He pushed himself off me and quickly wiped his cheeks, obviously embarrassed about it.

"I'm a horrible friend," he repeated a bit more evenly. "I'm an even worse boss. I think I'm going to close the company after this."

I recoiled with the shock and gave him a slap to the back of his head. "Don't be an idiot," I hissed at him. "I swear to whatever deity that may or may not exist, if you let your people down now, I will flay you and turn your skin into a pair of leather shoes."

"I've already let them down," he countered.

I scoffed. "They need you, Tony. Now more than ever. You're the glue that keeps them together. They need you as their boss, as their leader and their friend. Giving up on the company means you're giving up on them and I can't let you do that. I won't."

"But Lucy…" he trailed off.

"What happened with Lucy?" I asked and put the tea back in his hand, topping it off.

For a long time, he just sat, staring at the tea. Perhaps he hoped that I would go away or forget I had asked the question, but I stayed.

"I don't know what happened," he whispered so quietly that I almost didn't hear.

"That's the problem," he continued at an almost normal volume. "I left her and that – that bastard, he –" he cut himself off with a trembling breath.

"What bastard?" I asked, careful to keep my tone of voice level.

"I was only gone for a minute. I didn't imagine that they would try to do something with so many people around."

I swallowed hard. "What did they do?"

"James Rumsford tried to take her, apparently." He took a deep shuddering breath. "She said that Sir Rupert was waiting at the door for him to bring her."

I felt something cold constricting my internal organs.

"I think he hurt her, but I'm not certain. She wouldn't – she wouldn't talk to me."

I took a deep calming breath. "She has a big bruise on her upper arm, but that's all I've seen. She didn't tell me any of this, she only told me about Cubbins."

Tony bent his head. "A couple of Tendy agents helped her. I should have been there. I didn't even tell her I left."

I sighed heavily. "You know what? It sounds like you made a big mistake."

He ducked his head more as if I had hit him, but in the way that made me realise that he thought that was just what he deserved.

I put my hand on his back again.

"Tony. You made a mistake, which is terribly dangerous in this line of business, especially with the situation as it is right now, but in the end, that's all it was; a mistake. Lucy is alright or at least she will be. Then we'll kill James Rumsford, cut off his head, hands, and feet, throw the torso in the Thames and send the rest of the parts to the furnaces one by one disguised as Sources." I shrugged and took a bite of the donut.

He turned his head and gave me something close to his signature grin.

"You know I have the appropriate tools," I reminded him.

He chuckled. "It's good to know who to go to if I ever need to dispose of a body."

"You never know when you might need to. I think you should go home to rest."

He was about to protest but I cut him off.

"You should go home to rest, take a shower, get yourself sorted and then come back here. I'll stay and keep an eye out."

He wanted to protest again, but I raised a hand.

"That's an order. Not a request. I don't want to see you here until dinnertime at the earliest." I told him, using my 'supervisor-voice' that usually made teens clack their heels and salute.

Tony simply rolled his eyes, but he did stand up.

I stood with him and pulled him in for a tight hug.

"Stop trying to do everything on your own. You're not alone anymore, Tony. Please remember that. Promise?"

He didn't respond with anything other than a small sniffle.

"Promise," I repeated a bit sterner and squeezed him a bit tighter. He gave a small nod against my shoulder and I let him go.

"Now, go home. You stink."

He shot me a small smile, before leaving down the hall.

I plucked a book out of my bag and got comfortable.

Or as comfortable as it's possible to get on a wooden chair in a hospital corridor.

…

Lockwood is a boy who thought he could handle the responsibility of a man, realising now that he bit off more than he can chew.
In other words - Icarus has fallen. Now we need to pull him out of the sea.

I hope you enjoyed the chapter, however angsty it was. Not that the angst is something new if you reached this point.

Please leave a comment before you go and tell me what you think about Lockwood and Quill. Personally, I love the idiots.

I love you guys - thank you for reading!