A/N: This was only going to be the first half of a chapter, but it was taking a super long time to write and it was getting really long, so I divided it up so that you guys wouldn't have to wait forever. Still working on the second part, but it'll be in the next chapter.


Sara returned to the Globe through the backstage door. She took a deep breath, trying to calm her anxiety about Ray's message. One problem at a time, she told herself. Find the rift first. Figure out what to do about Ava second.

She wandered through the organized chaos of props and costumes, keeping her eyes peeled for anything unusual. As she made her way toward the stage, she heard Leonard's familiar voice, "If all the world's a stage, does that make you the star of the show?"

Sara looked up and spotted Leonard sitting on one of the higher steps of a thin staircase leading to the second level of the backstage area. "What's on the second floor?" she asked, nodded toward the top of the stairs.

"Dressing rooms, mostly," he answered.

"Anything that looks suspicious?"

"Besides several ridiculously oversized witches' cauldrons? No."

Sara tried to hide her disappointment by looking away. "Where's Mona?"

"Searching the upper seating levels." He glanced up toward the top of the stairs, then looked back down at Sara. "You know, I think there's a third floor too. I haven't checked it out yet and could use an extra pair of eyes."

Sara looked at him curiously. "You want me to come up there?"

He shrugged. "A second opinion wouldn't hurt. Normally, I case my targets for weeks, but my time's a little more limited here. Besides, you're the one with the best idea of what we're looking for."

"Which isn't much," she reminded him.

He leaned sideways and rested his head on top of the railing. "Come on, Sara," he said with a tiny smirk. "I thought you said you missed working with me."

She smiled and walked toward the bottom of the stairs. "Don't let it go to your head, Leonard," she said as she began to climb up.

"Too late," he replied as he stood up, turning around to lead the way.

The two of them climbed to the third floor behind the stage. As many props and sets as there had been downstairs, the third floor was filled with even more. Racks of costumes lay against each wall and crates containing everything from dishes to fake tree branches were crowded wherever they could fit. "This must be where they store everything," Sara observed. "I guess they haven't moved all of it downstairs for the performance yet."

"Seems like it," Leonard agreed. He watched her walk away from the stairs and begin sifting through the costumes. "So," he asked, folding his arms and leaning back against the nearest wall, "are you going to tell me what's bothering you, or do I have to guess?"

Sara stiffened and looked at him sharply. "What are you talking about?"

"Something's got you worried," he explained. "You're trying to hide it, but trust me, it isn't working."

Sara turned her back to him and continued her search. "Since when are you such an expert on me?"

"Never said I was," Leonard replied. "But I did see you walk back in from calling Raymond and you looked pretty tense. Then, you started pretending you weren't. You're not the only one here who can read people, Sara."

Sara turned back around to face him. "Is that why you invited me up here with you?" she asked him pointedly. "To question me?"

"No, but it was an added bonus."

Sara folded her arms and looked down at the floor, thinking of what to say. She wanted to wait on bringing up the new issue with the Time Bureau until after the rift was safely closed and the team was back together on the ship. At the same time, she knew it would be a relief to talk about it with someone who understood her the way Leonard always had. She hesitated for a moment, then lifted her eyes and took a step toward him. "Fine," she surrendered. "I am worried about something." Leonard nodded in acknowledgment. She continued, "Ray told me Ava called. She thinks she knows what happened with the rifts, but she only knows half the story."

"Which half?" Leonard asked.

Sara walked a couple steps closer to him, relaxing gradually as she talked. "She knows that something was removed from the timeline in a process that displaced a lot of temporal energy, creating the rifts. She also knows that it was done deliberately and by more than one person. What she doesn't know is who did it or exactly what they took." She paused, then continued, "Because of all this, the Time Bureau is sending its agents on a manhunt to arrest the ones who did it and recover whatever it was that got removed from time."

"Meaning," Leonard said, picking up where she left off, "they're really looking for us."

"Yes. But they don't know that yet."

"Hm," he said thoughtfully. "A time organization chasing down the Legends for messing with the timeline in a way they disapprove of. Sounds familiar."

Sara threw up her hands exasperatedly. "Leonard, this is serious!" She began to pace across the small storage room as she explained, "It's only a matter of time until Ava figures out that we altered the timeline. It could be hours, days, or weeks, but eventually, she'll know. Ray said I should go explain everything to her, but she's already decided that whoever did this are time criminals and it seems like she's treating it super seriously. If I come clean, how do I know she won't arrest me and the rest of the team on the spot?"

"And if you don't?" Leonard asked.

She stopped pacing and stood in front of him. "If I don't tell her the truth, then she'll still find out eventually, which means we'd basically be guaranteed to become fugitives at some point. Not that we haven't done that before, but it's not a good long-term situation. If Ava really wanted to put all her effort toward going after us, even as weak as the Time Bureau currently is, we'd have a lot more trouble to deal with than we need." She dropped her arms to her sides and sighed. "If I tell Ava the truth, she might get angry and think of us as criminals. If I don't, she also might get angry and think of us as criminals. She'll just do it a little bit later. There's no answer here that doesn't end with Ava being angry at us and thinking of us as criminals."

Leonard straightened up and stepped away from the wall, narrowing the space between them slightly. "Sounds like you're pretty worried about what Ava will think," he said, softening his usual snarky tone slightly.

"Well, yeah. She's the head of the Time Bureau. What she thinks matters."

"I know," Leonard agreed, "but don't you think you might be letting her into your head?"

"What? No!" Sara denied emphatically. "I'm just trying to make the best decision here. That means taking everything into account, including Ava's reaction."

Leonard nodded thoughtfully. "Yeah…I get that, but it seems to me like you're more concerned about avoiding a fight with her than anything else. Think of it this way: would you rather do something because it's what will make Ava the least upset, or because it's what you honestly think you should do? Personally, I'm no fan of the Time Bureau," he admitted, "but if you think you should tell them the truth, do it. Just don't do it for Ava. Do it for you."

Sara took a step backward, shaking her head. "No, you don't get it. That's not what this is about. You have no idea how the Time Bureau works or what our relationship with them is like."

"You're right," he said. "I don't. But I do know that you're a fearless captain who's never run away from a fight in her life. I'm not telling you which option to take. I'm just saying, whichever it is, I'd rather see you do it out of your own will than out of fear of someone else."

Sara rolled her eyes. "No, Leonard. You don't understand. Just leave it alone, okay?"

Leonard held up his hands innocently. "Fine, fine. If you say so..." He reached behind him and picked up a crown that had been sitting on top of a box full of royal-looking clothes and smirked mischievously as he handed it to, "...Your Worship."

Sara tried to hold back a smile. "Are you trying to distract me now?"

"Depends. Is it working?"

"Only a little." She looked down at the crown. "If I remember the story correctly, wouldn't I have to kill someone for this?"

"Not you," Leonard replied. "You're better than that."

Sara smiled a little and, after a moment of hesitation, took the crown and placed it on her head. "It's a little big," she commented as it fit loosely over her hair. Finally, she got it to stay in place and looked back at Leonard. "How do I look?" she asked with a teasing grin.

He stared at her silently for a moment. Beautiful, he mentally answered. Always beautiful. With a mockingly grand gesture, he knelt down on one knee and turned his eyes to the floor. "At your service, Your Majesty," he drawled.

Sara laughed. "You know, if the others could see this, they might think you actually have a fun side."

He looked up at her, "Good thing they can't. I'd hate for something like that to get out. It would really screw up my reputation."

"Well, we can't have that, can we?" Sara stepped aside to pick up a fake sword leaning against the opposite wall, then returned to her original place. She tapped the sword on his shoulders as he lowered his head again. "I dub thee Sir Leonard of Central City," she declared before tossing the prop aside.

"What an honor." He looked up at her again and, just a little bit too caught up in the game, reached up and took her hand in his, bringing it close to his lips to kiss it. Then, he realized what he was doing and froze. She said a little flirting was fine, he thought, but what if this is too far?

Sara noticed his brow furrow as he deliberated. "Leonard?" she asked, no longer attempting to mimic the voice of a queen. "You okay?"

He quickly dropped his hand, letting go of hers in the process. "Yeah. Peachy. Just…thinking." He stood up and backed away from her a couple of steps. Noticing that she was still closely watching him, he reiterated, "I'm fine."

Sara looked at him with visible confusion but shrugged it off after a moment. "Well, that was fun," she said, removing the crown from her head, "but now we need to get back to the mission."

"Right." He turned his head to avert his eyes from her. "The mission."

The two of them separated and continued their search, each on opposite sides of the room. While Leonard's back was turned, Sara threw a glance his way, watching him fondly for only a few seconds, but she turned away again before he could notice.


Mona wandered through the corridors behind the top level of seats. Finding it uncomfortably confined, she hummed a calming tune to herself as she walked along. She didn't see anything rift-like, but suddenly heard a strange sound. She stopped humming and heard it again. It sounded like footsteps. She froze and looked around nervously. It must be whoever left the door unlocked, she figured. But who would that be? She crept down the corridor toward the source of the sound.

A man turned the corner nearest to her and gasped as he nearly bumped into her. He had a brown mustache with a small beard and carried a well-worn notebook in his hands. "Great Caesar's ghost!" he exclaimed in surprise, nearly dropping his notebook. "Who are you?" he asked as he regained his composure. "And what are you doing here, so long before the next performance?"

Mona recognized him immediately. "Oh my gosh!" she squealed. "William Shakespeare!" She reached out her hand and shook his excitedly before he had the chance to protest. "Very pleased to meet you, sir. Mona Wu. Huge fan."

"Fan?" he repeated confusedly.

"Uh…never mind. I just really love your work, sir."

Shakespeare's face softened a little, though he still looked a bit concerned. "Ah, well, I am most flattered to hear that." He glanced aside toward the seats, then asked her, "But pray tell, why are you here? Not plotting mischief for my show, I hope?"

Mona shook her head. "No! Never. Trying to prevent it, actually."

His face turned grave. "As am I." He lowered his voice nearly to a whisper and explained, "There are many unpleasant rumors in the streets warning of danger and curses. They say I asked for trouble by putting real spells in my witches' mouths."

"Did you?" Mona asked.

"Heavens, no!" Shakespeare immediately denied. "I am neither foolish enough to do such a thing on purpose, nor unlucky enough to do it by accident." He paused hesitantly, then added, "However, should any trouble occur during the performance, I have no doubt that people will take it as confirmation. Thus, here I am, ensuring that nothing here has the potential to transform my fictional tragedy into a real one."

"Well," Mona said cheerfully, "my friends and I are here to help with that."

"Friends?" he echoed, looking around the corridor. "I see no one else with you."

"Oh, they're backstage. Don't worry!" she quickly assured him. "They're not sabotaging anything. They're just making sure nobody else does."

The playwright frowned and gave her a suspicious look. "Your story is quite strange. First, you enter the theater while it is not open to the public. Then, you claim to have come with friends who I do not see with you. And, last, you say that you are here to prevent trouble, almost as if you are aware of a plot." He took a step closer, analyzing her. "Are you aware of a plot? Or were you, perhaps, sent here by someone?"

"Well yes, but…not exactly. It's complicated."

"It would seem to be." Shakespeare glanced back over his shoulder, then back at Mona. "As much as I appreciate this meeting, if you cannot tell me the reason for your presence, then I must ask you and your friends to leave. You have an honest look about you, but with so many rumors spreading, I dare not take chances."

"And I totally get that," Mona replied, "but you have to believe me when I say that there's something going on here that you aren't going to understand, but my friends and I do and we're taking care of it."

"Why would I not understand?"

Mona tried to think of a way to explain to a man in the early 1600's that a hole had been ripped in the fabric of time itself somewhere in or near the theater and it now needed to be fixed with a blast of temporal energy from a guy with a flying, shrinking, super suit. She came up with nothing. "You just wouldn't, okay? It's a lot."

"A…lot?" The playwright seemed a bit confused by the expression.

"Yeah, it's…uh…overwhelming. For you. But not for us because we know how to deal with it."

"Indeed?" He seemed a bit amused by her insistence. "And what manner of people are you and your friends? Witch hunters?"

"No, no," Mona corrected him. "It's not the witch thing. We're not here about any magical witch problems. This is something totally different that it would take a super long time for me to explain to you. No offense!" she quickly exclaimed. "Because seriously, you're a legend, sir!"

Suddenly, a booming sound echoed through the Globe. Mona and Shakespeare exchanged concerned glances, then ran together out of the corridor and into the seating area. Looking down, Mona spotted the cause of the sound: a cloud of black smoke in the middle of the groundlings' area. As it cleared, she recognized a familiar shape and gasped, "Tabitha!"

Shakespeare turned to look at her. "Do you know this woman?"

"Unfortunately. And I take it back, we do have a magical witch problem."

"Oh dear."

Tabitha looked up and saw Mona's and Shakespeare's faces staring at her from the balcony seats. "It seems I just can't be rid of you Legends," she sneered, raising her staff to send a blast of dark-colored energy directly at the two onlookers.

Mona grabbed Shakespeare by the collar and yanked him back from the blast, hiding on the ground behind the seats. "Mr. Shakespeare," she instructed, "you have to get out of here. It's not safe." She cupped her hands over her faced and giggled, "Oh my gosh, I'm on a mission with William Shakespeare. This is so freaking cool!"

"I will abandon neither this theater not my play," Shakespeare insisted.

"Then come with me to find somewhere safe," Mona proposed, "where we can draw up a plan. You're too important to lose, sir."

A second blast hit the row of seats in front of them, throwing them back and against each other. "Very well," he conceded. "Lead on, though I continue to find you a most strange young woman."

"Oh, you have no idea," she replied, already feeling Wolfie begin to pick up on her accelerated heartbeat. Once the coast was clear, she darted back to the corridor with Shakespeare behind her.


"What was that?" Sara asked, hearing the booming sound from the far end of the backstage storage room.

Leonard straightened up and let his hand hover over his cold gun warily. "It came from down there," he said, nodding toward the stairs.

Sara bolted down the staircase, pulling out and assembling the retractable pieces of her staff as she did. Leonard followed, but she reached the bottom long before him. She ran out onto the stage and saw someone she really wished she didn't recognize. "Well, look who's back," she said, catching Tabitha's attention.

Tabitha stopped firing at Mona and spun around to face the leader of the Legends. "Ah, the infamous Captain Lance," she taunted. "Tell me, deary, was it you who gave the order to kill my Neron?"

"Neron broke his own promise," Sara told her. "It was his mistake and it cost him his life. Come quietly and I'll spare you yours."

"Not until I get my revenge!" Tabitha shouted, stretching out her staff. The blast of energy would have hit Sara, but she leaped over the edge of the stage to dodge it and lunged at the other woman with her weapon. Tabitha swung her staff around to parry the attack. They traded blow for blow, with Tabitha throwing the occasional blasts of magic at her opponent and Sara nimbly jumping, flipping, or sliding out of the way each time.

Leonard reached the stage and aimed his cold gun down toward Tabitha. He didn't know exactly who this weird woman was, but she was an enemy of Sara and the Legends, so that was all he figured he really needed to know for the moment. More questions could be asked later, when she wasn't a threat. Leonard adjusted his aim slightly but couldn't pull the trigger until Sara was out of the way, which seemed impossible considering how much she was moving. "Sara," he called out, "give me a clean shot!"

Sara swung her feet around, gripped Tabitha's staff in her own hands, and maneuvered herself to stand behind the witch, pulling the staff backward toward Tabitha's neck to prevent her from fighting back. "Is this clean enough?" she asked.

Tabitha struggled for a moment, then suddenly gripped Sara's hands tightly against the staff. It glowed in their hands and Sara felt herself thrown into darkness. She looked down and saw faces on all sides. So many faces. She felt a sinking feeling as she began to recognize them. It had been a long time since she'd seen any of them, but she knew who they were. "No," she whispered. "No. Not this. Not now."

She tried to find something else to look at, anything. Not finding much success, she finally stared down at her hands. To her horror, they were covered in blood. It didn't take much time for her to understand what that meant. "Oh…oh no. No. No, no, no." She tried to wipe the blood off on the ground, then her clothes. Neither option worked. She furiously rubbed her hands together, hoping at least some of it would come off from the friction. When she stopped for a moment to look at them again, they were still just as bloody. If anything, they were even bloodier. She looked up for help, but only saw the crowd of faces condemning her, then looked back down at her hands, staring at them as if in shock.

Leonard saw Sara fall to her knees behind Tabitha. He jumped off the stage and fired a cold blast at the witch as she attempted to flee. She managed to shield herself with magic, then vanished from sight. Leonard turned again to Sara and realized that she hadn't moved from where she'd fallen. She was staring at her hands with a look unlike anything he'd seen on her face before. He ran to her and knelt down in front of her. "Sara," he said softly, his voice wavering with worry. "Sara, what's wrong?"

"I…I killed them," she whimpered, not looking up. "I killed them all."

"No. Stop talking like that. Snap out of it." He searched her face for clues, trying to understand.

"Their faces," she said. "All the people I killed. And their blood. It's everywhere. It won't come off. I killed them. I'm a killer."

Leonard felt his heart break as he heard her say those words. "No! No, you're not, Sara. Don't you dare say that again." When she didn't respond, he placed a hand on her shoulder. "Do you hear me, Sara? That's not who you are."

"So much blood," she whispered, continuing to look at her hands. "I can't get it off."

Leonard began to internally panic as feelings of helplessness grew within him. He inferred that the strange magical woman – whoever she was – had done something to mess with Sara's head, but he hadn't the faintest idea what she'd done or how to undo it. Magic was confusing enough on its own, and the intense emotions he felt at the sight of Sara being harmed didn't make anything clearer. He looked down at her hands and understood what she was seeing. Trying to stay calm, he took both of his hands and laid them in her open palms. "Look," he said gently, his voice barely above a whisper. "There's no blood. There's nothing there. Just me. It's just me."

She felt his hands touch hers and looked up for the first time. She was still surrounded by darkness, but the faces of her past victims were beginning to fade. She wrapped her hands tightly around his and shut her eyes, blocking out the last traces of the vision. "Just you," she breathed.

"Just me." He leaned in closer and continued to speak softly, saying every possible calming thing that came into his mind at that moment, "I'm here. I've got you. You're safe. You're not a killer. That's not you anymore." He took a breath and leaned in even closer. "You're so strong, Sara. I know you are. You're going to be okay. Everything's going to be okay. Just…come back to me. Please come back to me."

Sara blinked a few times, then fully opened her eyes. The illusion of blood was gone, as were the faces and the darkness. She continued to clutch Leonard's hands tightly and leaned forward, resting her head against his chest. The rhythm of his heartbeat was unexpectedly comforting. Eventually, she relaxed her hands, letting his go. He wrapped his arms carefully around her and held her close as her breathing gradually slowed to match his.

Leonard kept his eyes wide open and alert over Sara's shoulder, watching out for any sign of Tabitha coming back. Simultaneously, he whispered into her ear, "You're a hero, Sara. You're the strongest, bravest person I know. You're so much more than whatever she just made you think you are."

Sara lifted her head and sat up straight. Leonard loosened his arms but didn't fully let go. They looked each other in the eyes. He was relieved to see that the look of horror on her face was gone. "That was Tabitha," she explained. "We've fought her before. She made me see things. Things from my past. People I killed…"

"And blood on your hands," Leonard finished for her.

"Yeah." She tilted her head sideways, her sense of humor making a return. "A bit too on the nose, wasn't it?"

He visibly relaxed as he heard her joking again. It was a good sign. "Well, it wasn't exactly subtle," he agreed.

Sara jumped back up to her feet. "Do you know where she went?" she asked as Leonard also stood up. "Did you see?"

"No," he said, still not taking his eyes off her, both out of awe at how quickly she had bounced back and fear that she would be hit with a second wave of whatever had just happened. "She must be long gone by now."

Sara looked down in frustration, then turned back to Leonard as a lightbulb went off in her head. "No, she's not," she realized. "Tabitha is way more powerful now than the last time we fought her. She's the anachronism, and she's drawing power from the energy of the rift to enhance her magic. That's how she was able to create a vision from elements of my past. She didn't enter my mind. She manipulated the power of time to use my past against me. She's going to want to stay close to the rift because if she goes too long without returning to her source, her powers will be limited."

"So," Leonard said, understanding immediately, "if the rift is here…"

"She'll be back for round two," Sara finished for him. She picked up her staff from where it had fallen on the ground and held it front of her, prepared to fight. "And this time, we'll be ready."