Chapter 31 – Awkwardness

"C-Claire?"

The professor couldn't believe what he was seeing. Claire had died twelve years ago... almost to the day. "But we went back twelve and a half years..." he thought, realising. Claire wasn't due to have the accident for another few months yet. And here she was, crying, seeing him kissing another woman...

Guilt began to rise up inside the pit of his stomach. How would he ever explain this to her without telling her of her inevitable fate? How would she ever be able to understand? All of these things ran through the professor's panic-stricken mind as the four of them stood in silence, with Claire looking into the professor's eyes.

"Um... Professor..." Luke tried, but couldn't find any words to make sense of the situation.

"... Who's she?" Claire choked, trying to compose herself.

The professor didn't reply. He just stood and stared at Claire.

Emmy cleared her throat. "Er... this isn't what you think, Claire. Really. We... well... it's complicated."

"I'm sure it is." Claire wiped her eyes on the back of her hand. She glared at Emmy. "How do you know my name? Did he tell you?" she pointed to the professor.

"Well... yes. Please, let us explain; let's go somewhere more private—"

"I want to hear it from Hershel." Claire looked into his eyes once more. "I never thought that you of all people would do something like this..." Her eyes filled with tears once more.

"It's not like that, honestly Claire..." the professor began.

"Then what is it like? Because that kiss didn't look like an accident to me."

"We're from the future, Claire. Everything is different in the future. But we can't talk about it here. Who knows who could hear us out here?" Emmy gestured to the pedestrians who walked past, seemingly uninterested in their conversation. "Please, let's go somewhere private, and we'll explain more."

"The future? You came back here?" Claire stopped crying and moved in closer to them. "Was it with the machine that we are working on in the Department of Poly-Dimensional Physics?" she said quietly to Layton.

"No... The other one."

Claire frowned. "What other one? You don't really mean...?"

"We do," the professor said.

Claire was silent for a moment, then nodded. "Where do you want to go?"

The professor checked his watch. "My other self is still in the university at this time. Let's go back to our house."

The four of them were silent for a moment as they were all sat in the professor's living room from twelve and a half years ago. The only sounds that could be heard were the ticking of the Professor's grandfather clock, the exact same one that always stood next to his old sofa, as it did then, and the clinking sound of the professor stirring his tea with a shaky hand.

Emmy felt anxious. It felt so strange to feel out of place in her own home. There was also the fact that the professor was refusing to meet her eye whenever she looked at him. She looked at Luke, who was stood beside her armchair, and noticed that the poor lad didn't know where to look or what to do with himself. She had also noticed that Claire hadn't stopped staring at her the whole time. Emmy understood that Claire was confused and upset by Emmy's presence, and that Claire had every right to be angry or upset. But at the same time, none of it was Emmy's fault either. Emmy just didn't want to be there.

The professor tapped his spoon off the side of his cup and dropped it onto the table with a clatter. The other three looked over to him.

"I believe now is the time to give Claire her explanation," the professor said calmly. He seemed to have calmed down a bit, but not completely. "Before we have to leave."

"What? You're leaving already?" Claire asked.

"We'll explain that later. First we should tell you how we got here," Emmy said.

Claire nodded for Emmy to continue.

"We came here in a time machine that you and your father invented years ago."

"Yes, I remember working on it with him, but we could never get it to work," Claire said with a frown.

"Well, we got your brother Markus and Dimitri to take a look at it—" the professor began.

"Dimitri? How does he know about it?"

"Well, in our time, we told him about it and he and Markus, who is to study in the field of poly-dimensional physics like you and your father before him, managed to repair a broken connection and tweak it a bit to get it to work," the professor explained. "But the vast bulk of the work was completed by you and your father."

"So, Dimitri and Markus fixed it and you came here? But why?"

Emmy and the professor shared a look and sighed. "It's a really long story."

"It always is with us," Luke smiled.

Claire smiled back at him.

"So, back to why we're here," the professor said. "Do you know a lady named Andrea McIntyre?"

Claire's expression soured. "Oh, yes."

"Well..."

"She has a crush on the professor and she's trying to kill Emmy in the most complicated way possible," Luke said. "In a nutshell."

Claire's eyes widened. "Really?"

"Yes," the professor said.

"Well, a crush is a bit of an understatement in that regard," Emmy pointed out. "She's completely obsessed. She'll stop at nothing, even if it means killing him and herself. She's crazy."

"My word..." Claire looked horrified. "I just thought she was a jealous... well... individual, but I never thought that she would do something even that extreme... what is she trying to do?"

"She's messing around with our pasts and threatening to erase us all from existence if we don't let her do whatever she wants," Emmy said angrily.

"Has she tried to make a move on Hershel yet?"

"No," the professor sighed, "but I think it's only a matter of time."

"So, Andrea brought you all here?" Claire asked.

"Kind of. We followed her here to make sure that she doesn't do anything she shouldn't," Luke replied. "Right now... er..."

"She'd be trying to find a way over to Ireland to take my younger self and Leon to the machine so they can be in our present in the first place," Emmy said.

Claire raised an eyebrow. "Your younger self? And where is she?"

"She is currently with Emmy's uncle and his younger self tailing Andrea until we all meet up later," the professor said.

"But you can't have met your younger self... that would create some sort of paradox... wouldn't it?" Claire asked.

"Well, it hasn't so far..." Emmy frowned.

"This is certainly strange. So you think that she has brought your younger self to your time to threaten you into letting her be with Hershel?" Claire asked with a smile. "Well, that's not going to work. Even if you did what she wanted, Hershel wouldn't be with her if he didn't have feelings for her, otherwise he'd be giving her false hope, and he wouldn't do that to someone, I know him..." Claire looked uneasily at the professor, then at Emmy.

The professor and Emmy shared a look and sighed.

"Claire..." the professor began. "I know that you are very confused as to why I am not with you in the future, but we cannot tell you why, for your own safety—"

"Yes, no one person is allowed to know too much about their own destiny, otherwise they risk creating some sort of paradox, I know," Claire said, looking upset. "But... I just don't understand why Andrea would come to this time in the first place. Kidnapping Emmy's younger self will only create more problems; it won't resolve anything for her."

"I think Andrea is in a bad frame of mind. No one in their right mind would go messing with time and space, after all," Emmy pointed out. "All we can do is go with what is happening and try to put a stop to the worst of the damage."

"And that is where we will need your assistance, Claire," the professor said. "If I recall correctly, in this time, my car is currently under repair, correct?"

Claire nodded.

"Well, when it is ready, I need to borrow it."

"Well, I got a call this morning, and they said that it was ready," Claire said. "I told them that I would tell Hershel – my Hershel – to collect it later today. Why, what do you need it for?""

"We need to follow Andrea over to Ireland, where she is to kidnap Emmy's younger counterpart and her uncle. I shall go and collect the car later and we will drive over on a cargo ship, or a ferry, and follow her."

"But why?" Claire asked, frowning. "Emmy's younger self has already been sent to your time before, so if you stop this then you could jeopardise you existence."

"We don't want to stop her; we need to drop off my younger self and my uncle. The professor has a memory scanner thingy there, so he'll remove their memories of being in the future and send them home, so that they can lead their normal lives and everything can be... well... normal," Emmy smiled.

"I... I see. Kind of... anyway... the man at the garage should recognise you Hershel, so you should get the car without too much trouble... and if you go to Pembroke harbour and just give them the money upfront, they should let you on and give you a return ticket... I'm sure Mum did that before..."

"Thank you, Claire." The professor smiled at her.

"One last thing, Hershel..."

"Hmm?"

"I'm going with you."

"WH-what?!" Luke spluttered.

"Oh, come on," Claire sighed. "You're going on this quest through time, and you really think that I, a poly-dimensional researcher whose life revolves around things like this, am going to let you all off on your own with no real knowledge of the affects of time travel so you can mess it up and in a worst-case-scenario end the world? No offense... but I can't let you do this without me."

"Er... is that supposed to happen?" Luke asked.

Emmy shrugged. "You know, I really don't think we have any other choice."

The professor smiled. "I remember... the car... you told me that you needed to use the car to go on a trip for research purposes... a new technology being experimented on in Ireland... that's what you meant..."

Claire smiled. "And there is the excuse I am going to use for my Hershel."

"So... Claire's coming?" Luke asked.

"I believe so," the professor replied.

"Okay..." Emmy said, looking worried. "One thing, though..."

"Hmm?"

"How are Celeste and Markus going to react?"