Author's Note: Sorry it's been so long since this story has been updated. Got wrapped up writing chapters for Tempest in a Teapot.
Five Hours in Ye Old London
Chapter 7: Family Dynamics
Ashley pulled the pile of small plates to her and began distributing the delicate porcelain pieces to the others around the table. "These are pretty plates," the child remarked, holding one up to get a better look. "We have flowers like this in our garden. I bring mommy roses all the time from the garden," she informed her new relatives.
Helen smiled down at her daughter. It was true. Ashley loved to bring her little bouquets of flowers from her garden so much so that the garden had been expanded over the years to keep up with the child's picking habits. Otherwise there wouldn't be a flower left in the garden at the end of three months.
"The plates belonged to your grandmother," the blonde shared with the child as she took in the look of adoration that the older version of herself bestowed on her only child. If she had any concerns that motherhood would not agree with her, which she really hadn't, the proof was sitting right before her.
"You know my grandmother?" Ashley asked, putting down her plate and beginning to distribute the forks and linen napkins.
The two Helens looked at one another. "Yes," the blonde said carefully.
"I didn't know her," Ashley confided to her 'cousin.' "She died a long time ago before I was born."
The blonde gave her a sweet smile. "Your grandmother would have loved you."
Ashley returned her smile with a sweet, dimpled one as she reached for the large teapot.
Her father's hand shot out and stopped her. "Perhaps someone else should pour," he suggested. His daughter had more than once accidently poured tea on him while playing tea party and those times had involved either tepid or cold tea. He wasn't too keen on experiencing hot tea being dumped on him nor did he think anyone else at the table would appreciate it. Younger Helen had already changed her dress once since the child's arrival.
Ashley frowned. "I want to pour the tea. It's my tea party, daddy," she reminded him.
"Your father's right, Ashley," Helen interceded. "At an English tea it is proper for the lady of the house to pour the tea. That would be her," she indicated by pointing to the blonde.
"But I want to pour," her daughter whined, pushing her father's hand away in annoyance.
Blonde Helen reached for the tea pot after her older version motioned to it while suggesting that her daughter served the food instead.
"I don't want to serve the food. I want to pour," Ashley stubbornly insisted, crossing her arms and pouting. Her bottom lip was puffed up and a long line creased across her little forehead.
Gently placing his hand on her forehead, John titled her face in order to look up at him. "Ashley," her father warned, "either do as your mother says or you can have a time out, young lady." He resisted the urge to laugh, keeping his face stern, as his daughter glared up at him with the stubborn look he knew so well. She was mirroring the same look her mother often gave him when she didn't like what she was being told.
"You can't give me a time out," Ashley smartly told him, "we're not at home so I can't go up to my room." Ha, take that, she thought, as she stuck her tongue out at her father.
"There are four corners in this room, you can stand and face one of them," he retorted, not please with his daughter's little temper tantrum. He looked to his left at Helen, who also had a displeased look on her face.
"Blah, blah, blah, I see you talking but I can't hear you," the girl chattered as she made a mouth opening and closing motion with one hand. She looked around at the others and stopped when she saw the look on her mother's face. Uh oh. She might have gone too far this time.
"Ashley Amelia Druitt-Magnus, you apologize to your father this instant, young lady," her mother sternly ordered.
The girl bit her bottom lip and looked to the others for help. James and Nikola both looked highly amused but weren't going to interfere on her behalf. Her 'cousin' Helen looked shocked and had stopped pouring tea into the teacups. Daring a glance at her parents Ashley saw they were both frowning at her. Sticking a finger in her mouth nervously, the child asked, "Did I say a bad word?"
"Not a bad word, but what you said was incredibly rude. Especially coming from a young person," her father informed her. They both stubbornly stared at one another neither wanting to give ground.
Helen sighed. "Ashley, go stand in the corner," she instructed, pointing to the corner nearest to them.
"I don't wanna!" her daughter whined, her eyes starting to tear up.
"Now," her mother ordered in a tone that broke no argument. She was very unhappy with her daughter's little temper tantrum in front of the others, especially her younger counterpart who looking very shocked at Ashley's behavior. Victorian children were expected to be better behaved in public.
"Fine!" Ashley spat out as she slid off her father's lap, smacking his hands away as he tried to protect her from falling during her descent. His hat fell off as he leaned over and he ignored it. Ashley stalked off loudly to the corner behind Watson and turned to glare at her parents with her arms crossed and her lips pursed. "You're all mean to me," she sniffed loudly.
Motioning from Ashley to Helen, John said, "That is pure Magnus," and received a dirty look from the mother of his child.
"Well, there's no need to guess which one of your team taught her that lovely little line," Nikola remarked as he stood up, walked over to the nearby liquor cabinet to pick up the cork screw, and returned to his seat. He went to work opening the wine bottle as Helen leaned forward to pick up one of sandwiches.
"You don't know it was a member of my team," Helen half-hearted defended, but then who else could it be. They had keep Ashley under close watch since she had been re-born and the child rarely left the Sanctuary grounds unless she was heavily escorted by her parents. John and Nikola had dealt a death blow to the Cabal but Helen wasn't going to take any chances with her child's life again. She was being too protective she knew but so be it. Her daughter's safety was her main priority.
"Nor does one have to guess who she was saying it to," John added. The only person who would have said such a snarky little line would have been Ms. Freelander and it would have been directed to Dr. Know-it-all Zimmerman.
James raised an eyebrow at her as he began helping himself to some sandwiches. He shook his head at Nikola's silent offer of wine. "So you have a cheeky team, do you, Helen?" he asked to redirect the topic away from the child standing three feet behind him. His back was to her and he could hear her scuffing her socked feet back and forth as she pouted. To his left, younger Helen was looking conflicted, wanting to allow the child to rejoin the adults but refraining from interfering with the child's parents' disciplining of the girl.
"No more than usual," Helen replied as she took a sip of her tea. She gave Druitt and Tesla a look as they both snorted.
"Please, Booty has quite the smart little mouth on her and Dr. Whiner is constantly trying to tell everyone what they should be doing or feeling," Nikola confessed to James with a smirk.
"Booty? That's an interesting name," James remarked as he reached for another sandwich.
Nikola snickered as John starting choking on his sandwich in laughter. "That is not her name," Helen told Watson as she reached over to whack Druitt on the back hard twice. "It's a nickname Nikola has assigned to her." She returned to her tea as John exhaled a deep, clear breath, still chuckling.
"What does booty mean?" Watson inquired innocently, causing John to start laughing again, this time with Nikola joining in.
"Never you mind," Helen discouraged.
"Bum," John gasped out in laughter. "Nikola thinks she has a nice bum." He, Tesla and James all laughed at that, even more so at the startled look on blonde Helen's face and the reprimanding one on her darker counterpart.
"Really, John," Helen said. Men could be so childish she thought.
Looking to change the topic, John reached for another watercress sandwich. "These are excellent. I haven't had them in years."
"I made them," a child's voice called.
"They're very yummy," her father answered, noting that she was no longer pouting nor crossing her arms. Her temper tantrum had run its course.
"Can I leave time out now, mommy?" she asked, eager to rejoin the adults. She didn't like being ignored and not being able to be a part of the activities.
Helen nodded, relieved that her daughter's melt down had not gotten worse. "Only if you're ready to apologize to your father."
Ashley rejoined her parents, climbing this time into her mother's lap. She started to reach for a scone as Helen reminded her, "What are you supposed to say?" Turning, Ashley looked at her father and said, "I'm sorry, daddy."
He nodded. "Apology accepted."
Grabbing a scone and the pot of Devonshire cream, Ashley threw out over her shoulder to her father, "I saw you drop your hat and not pick it up." The adults smiled. The child did have some wits about her.
Younger Helen pushed the bowl of jam in front of the child, relieved her punishment was over. Normally she wouldn't be so bothered by a child being reprimanded but then this was not any child, it was hers. Well, sort of.
The adults made small talk as they watched the child pile on the cream and jam on bottom half of her scone before smooshing the other half of the scone on top of the pile. Happily, Ashley lifted the oversized sweet to her mouth only to have bottom part shoot out sideways as she bit down. It dropped onto the floor, just barely missing John as it fell between Helen's chair and his. "Oops," Ashley murmured.
Quick, clicking noises could be heard rushing over, accompanied by snuffling. Leaning over, the child squeal, "Winston!" and reached down to pet the dog. Helen, unprepared for her daughter's sudden sideways movement, had to quickly grab hold of her dress. At the same time, John had moved his arm out to catch her if she fell forward. Heads close together, both parents looked at one another and shared the same thought. Their daughter was a handful.
Oblivious to it all, Ashley was patting the dog and chatting away as he woofed up the sweet. He looked up, smelled the sweet jam and cream smeared around her faced and leaned up to lick her across the mouth. "Ack!" Ashley screeched, sitting up while spitting and wiping at her mouth with the sleeve of her dress. "Winston kissed me!"
"He is rather fond of Devonshire cream," James said, smiling at the child. There were still traces of cream around her nose and jam across her cheek. The sleeve of her dress was now stained as well and he was beginning to understand how she and his Helen ended up having to change clothes earlier.
Helen leaned around to look down at her daughter's face. "Oh dear, we better get you cleaned up."
"Wait, I want to finish my scone!" the child said, grabbing the remaining part to shove it in her mouth. A glob of jam fell down onto her mother's dark leather dress. "Thank you," Helen remarked dryly, shaking her head as Ashley giggled and grinned up at her with more sticky stuff smeared around her mouth, and wiped at her dress with a napkin. It was a good thing her dress was leather and easy to wipe up.
Just then, Ashley felt Winston near her feet and slunk down a little trying to pet the dog with her feet. She giggled as Winston sniffed her socks and slouched down further, feet wiggling to touch him. "Okay, young lady, let's get us cleaned up." Wrapping her arm firmly around her silly daughter's waist, Helen sat up slightly to push her chair back. John reached over and helped pulled the chair back. Helen stood and lowered the child to the ground.
"Good, cuz I gotta potty," Ashley said as she crossed her legs and squirmed.
That caused the adults to all grin. "I think I remember the way," Helen told her younger version and led her squirming child out of the room.
Observing the blonde as she stared after them, John smiled. "I told you she was stubborn," he reminded her. Lifting his cup to his mouth, he shared, "Personally, I think she inherited that from her mother."
She looked back at him, a small smile gracing her lovely face. "Then her temper must come from her father."
"What, that?" John laughed, referring to their daughter's little temper tantrum earlier. "That's nothing. You should see one of her meltdowns when she wants to sleep with her parents and not in her own bed," he said offhand, not realizing that he'd just given her information about the state of his relationship with her older counterpart. Helen's eyes got bigger as she took in the news that she and John were currently sleeping together in addition to raising their daughter.
James caught it though, and frowned. Nikola rolled his eyes and stood up. All this family talk was beginning to get nauseating. "I'm going to check on the continuum device," he announced, thinking to himself as he strolled out of the room that he'd stop by the wine cellar on his way back. The two bottled he'd brought up earlier were now empty.
"What happens when you get back to your time?" James asked, hoping to shift the subject at hand. He did not want to linger on the thought of Helen and John sleeping together again.
"Well, as soon as we walk back into the Sanctuary, we all get to have another round of shots to counteract the radiation poisoning. Then we all go through medical scans to make sure there's nothing else wrong and… well, after that," he looked thoughtful as he pictured it in his head, "Helen and I wrangle our daughter into bed after having another discussion about her remaining where we leave her." John looked directly at his young love. "Helen soon goes back to being wrapped up in her work. And I go back on creature patrol to ensure none of her beasties eat or kill any of us."
"And what about Tesla?" James asked, standing up to move about. They'd been sitting for well over an hour and his long legs needed a stretch. John stood to stretch as well. "Oh, he'll do his usual. Putter around in his lab, occasionally blowing something up, and drain the wine cellar."
Helen stood too, stretching out her back as modestly as possible. "And you all live together at the Sanctuary?" she asked incredulously. The idea of John and Nikola living under the same roof was unfathomable. The two couldn't stand one another.
"Unbelievable, isn't it?" John grinned.
Footsteps alerted them to their presence just as Ashley burst into the room, her mother showing up a few seconds later. "I'm back!" the child announced cheerfully.
Noting Nikola was no longer present, Helen wondered aloud of his whereabouts.
"He went to check on the device," Watson answered first. He sat down in his favorite wing chair as he filled his pipe. Winston curled up by his owner's feet and looked up as the child descended up him again to pet him.
"Perhaps I should go see if he needs any help," she murmured. Helen felt a little guilty for Nikola having to bear the brunt of the work getting them home. Whatever his faults, Tesla always came through for her when she truly needed him. His constant draining of the wine cellar was a small price to pay and she had simply learned to hide her most treasured bottles of rare wine from him.
"I'll go," Druitt volunteered. "A stretch of the legs will do me good."
He'd taken one step when Ashley ran over to grab a hold of his hand. "Zort, zort, zort!" his daughter chanted, bouncing up and down excitedly.
"It's just downstairs, Ashley. I can walk you know," he teased her. It did actually stroke his ego how much his only child loved to teleport with him. Her ability had been dormant in her first life but her parents both suspected that the ability would emerge this go round at some point. Thus he had taken it upon himself to slowly instruct her on how to teleport as a safe guard for if and when the ability would suddenly materialize.
"That's no fun," the child pouted. "Zort, daddy, zort!" she pleaded and looked up him with her big puppy dog eyes. Big, blue hopeful eyes that so reminded him of her mother.
"Very well," John said indulgently and then they were gone in a bright blur of red.
"Zort?" James asked before putting his pipe into his mouth.
"Teleport," Helen explained. "Ashley couldn't pronounce it correctly when she was little and called it 'zort' instead."
Younger Helen had gasped as they disappeared and looked worriedly at her older self. "You are not worried about Ashley teleporting away with John?"
Crossing over to sit on the love seat across from James, Helen calmly answered, "She is fine with her father. He'll keep her safe." She gave her younger self a serious stare. "Your Ashley teleport with her father… Hell no!" she exclaimed strongly.
"Language, madam, I implore you," James teased, shaking his pipe at her, and laughed as she stuck her tongue out at him in response. "I see where she gets it from," he smirked.
Her younger version smiled distractedly at their play but her mind was focused on John and their daughter. Here, Ashley was happily attached to her father, who it appeared was a doting father. But as her older version had just reminded her, the John Druitt that was of her timeline was still in the grips of his madness when she would give birth to their child for the first time. She wondered when John had been finally cured of his insanity. Had it been while Ashley was still alive the first time or had the cure taken place after her death? Either way, it was a depressing thought to know that his condition would go on for over a century.
