Max Waters had settled into watching the ten o'clock news on his old television when he heard a knock on the door - he certainly wasn't expecting company for the evening, and had half the mind to ignore it, but got up to check anyway. He was surprised to see a very flustered looking Gwen Buchanan on his front porch, and he opened the door just slightly to greet her, not wanting the young woman to see him so unkempt in his pajamas.

"Gwen, this is a surprise," he said with a chuckle that she usually would have reciprocated, but the wet-haired girl in front of him simply kept her arms wrapped around herself, glancing over her shoulder every few moments. "Bryce is still out - they sent him to investigate a food poisoning outbreak in Monterey, see if he could catalog anything new."

"I came to see you, Mr. Waters," she said shakily, waving her hand to stop his explanation. Glancing backwards again, she made another brief, frenetic gesture with her hand and another figure who had been lurking at the bottom of the porch steps emerged, removing the hood of his jacket as he approached.

Max's eyes widened as a familiar face - though in appearance about fifteen or twenty years younger than he'd been when he'd last seen him - stepped into the faint yellowish glow of the porch light. This, he was sure, was Dr. Will Caster - somehow no older than his early thirties, but unmistakably the same man that he had once called a friend.

"Hello, Max."

"Will."

"Oh. You know each other. Great," Gwen said hesitantly. Upon sensing the girl's discomfort growing with every passing second she spent outside, Max gestured for them both to come inside, quickly shutting the door and the blinds behind them. Finally somewhere she felt safe, Gwen sank onto the couch, briefly covering her face with her hands and groaning in exhaustion before looking up at Max. "Mr. Waters, I think I've done something really serious," she said fearfully. "I - I think I killed Milford Duggan."

"You think?" Max said, suddenly taking on an almost fatherly tone with the young woman who, in all fairness, had practically grown up with him as much as his own son had. "How can you - is there…" he stammered, completely awestruck. "Is there a body?"

"You're looking at it," Gwen replied, glancing over at Will - and it seemed that just looking at him again overwhelmed her, as she let out a heavy sigh and buried her head in her hands again. "I - I panicked. Duggan attacked me and I tried to stop him, but he was bleeding so bad - I was worried he wouldn't be able to get up," she stammered. "The samples I've been working on - I thought maybe it would heal the headwound enough for me to bring him to the police, to turn him in, but instead…"

Gwen stood up and started pacing across the floor, and in the pause in her explanation, Max looked again at Will in utter disbelief. He was in a real body again, a real human body. He wasn't just the production of nanoparticles and digitized memories. He was a human again, and it was all because of Gwen Buchanan, the little girl he had seen grow up alongside his son.

"I didn't think this would happen - it was the first time I've ever tested the strain on an actual person. These things aren't supposed to work the first time," Gwen said frantically. "I am in so much trouble, I don't know what to -"

"Gwen - Gwen," Max said abruptly, walking over and planting his hands firmly on the girl's shoulders. "Listen to me. Don't do this - don't do this to yourself now, okay? Something very bad just happened to you, and we can't work anything else out until you're okay," he chided. Gwen nodded, and he brought her up to the guest bedroom - which was, in all honesty, practically her room in their house as they rarely had any other guests. It took only minutes for her to fall asleep, and once he felt assured that the young woman was at least resting as she deserved to, he went downstairs to find Will looking at the photos on the wall.

"You don't have any photos of Evelyn and me."

"They've practically erased you from history, Will," Max said darkly. "I was ordered to destroy any photos of any of us together, all I have left is memories. I'm lucky they let me have those. But Jesus Christ," he said, shaking his head and pinching the bridge of his nose. "Is this really happening? I can't believe you're standing in my living room -"

"This is revolutionary."

"This is inhuman," Max retorted, shaking his head. This exchange felt so familiar, as did the faint impulse to beat some sense into the man - but it was laced with relief at seeing him again. "Milford Duggan is a man with a wife and kid on the way, did you know that?" Max's voice faltered as he attempted to defend his posturing, his defense of humanity and the value of Duggan's life, but Will quickly countered.

"Milford Duggan was scum, and he just tried to sexually assault a young woman you obviously care about like she was your own daughter," Will said. "And it's too late, I can't give Milford Duggan this body back - I didn't take it on purpose, and I can't give it back."

"How long has she been keeping you a secret?" Max asked, his face slightly puckered in displeasure. "She found you in the garden, didn't she?"

"She did. About a month ago," Will nodded. "And you're the only one who could have sent her there. You knew - you knew, didn't you Max? You knew you could bring me back."

"This is insane," Max said, unable to contribute much else. "Do you know what this could do to Gwen? To her future? My son is in love with that girl and if anything happens to her, it might kill him."

"Hey, Dad, I just saw Gwen's car out front, is she -"

Max turned and looked at the door as his son walked in, clearly surprised to see someone else in their home this late in the evening. He froze and blinked, but nodded in greeting before glancing to his father for an explanation.

"Gwen is upstairs sleeping - let her rest. Something went wrong at work, and I think she should be the one to tell you about it," Max explained calmly. "This is a friend of mine. Will Caster -"

"Will Caster?" Bryce asked, his eyes narrowing in what Max quickly realized was recognition. "Dr. Caster, the one who was responsible for the Great Collapse? Dad, I've read your old papers in your study, I know who he is - why is he so young? Why is he here?!"

"I can go," Will nodded calmly. "Max, you know where to find me."

But Will Caster taking his leave from the Waters home did not dissolve the tension that had settled between the father and son.

Gwen didn't stir until the next morning and even then, she refused outright to tell Bryce about what had happened. She was fine, she insisted. She cited whatever had occurred as some sort of "minor disagreement" in the office, and was adamant in her insistence not to press the issue further. She had breakfast with the Waters men, and she and Bryce each drove to work separately since her car was still parked outside.

They pulled into adjacent parking spaces in the garage area of the Gatekeeper Headquarters, and as they walked together towards the entrance, Bryce gave a sigh.

"You're really not going to talk to me?" he asked, moving so that he was walking backwards in front of her, slowing their pace considerably.

"I've been talking to you all morning."

"That's not what I'm talking about, Gwen."

She appeared as though she was about to provide some sort of retort when unexpectedly, someone exited the building just as they approached, spotted her, and gave her arm a mighty yank. Gwen turned as she stumbled to see a blonde-haired woman sporting a round, pregnant belly - Christie Duggan.

"Where is my husband?!" she cried shrilly, giving Gwen's arm a hard shake and shouting loudly enough to be heard by everyone in the lobby, as well as everyone just entering the building. "Where's Milford?! I know it's you - I know how he pines after you, because you're a young, pretty little thing - I see him staring at you at all the company parties, don't think I don't -"

"I have no idea where your husband is -"

"He didn't come home last night!" Christie shrieked, yanking Gwen's arm again as the younger woman tried to pull away while Bryce looked in horror. In any other case, he would have leapt to his best friend's defense, but how could he defend her against a pregnant woman? "Where is he? I know he must have gone to see you -"

"Yes. Yes, he did," Gwen said loudly, her voice now angrily matching Christie's in volume. She didn't want to do this in front of everyone, and she certainly didn't want to do it in front of Bryce, but the confrontation left few alternatives. "Your husband came to my lab and tried to rape me last night because he's a drunk pig - I fought him off, and I don't know where he went after that. Are you satisfied?!" she hissed. It was mostly true, anyway.

Christie Duggan removed her hand from Gwen's arm as though she'd just been burned, staring at the young woman in horror. "No," she said in disbelief as the numerous bystanders began to chatter in quiet uproar at the revelation. "My husband would never -"

"Oh, he would never? Okay," Gwen interrupted, reaching and pulling up the sleeve of her shirt to reveal a set of bruises on her arms that were clearly from being grabbed and relatively fresh in appearance. Christie pulled away from her and gaped in outrage, her shoulders shaking.

"No," she said, shaking her head piteously. Her voice was shrill and drawing attention from all onlookers, even while Gwen's bruised arm was still bare for everyone to see. "Milford wouldn't do that. Where did he -"

"My guess is that he ran - far away," Gwen said, taking a step backwards. She felt Bryce wrap an arm around her shoulders, and with one last glance towards Christie, she allowed her friend to lead her away, into the building. Gwen directed her gaze down towards her feet, ill-equipped to receive the stares that followed her now that everyone had heard. Wordlessly, she bolted for the elevator and retreated to her lab to be alone, leaving Bryce completely dumbstruck by the revelation.

He was there to meet her in their usual spot at lunchtime - they always took their lunch a bit late to avoid the crowds in the facility's dining hall - and she arrived like clockwork, her eyes darting around the room rapidly as though more determined than usual to simply avoid everyone. She rested her elbows on the table and groaned miserably as she took a seat across from Bryce.

"Why didn't you tell me?" he asked, sliding a pre-packaged salad across the table to her, nudging her arm with the small plastic tray until she chuckled weakly, reaching out to remove the lid and take a bite.

"I just didn't want to talk about it," she admitted through bites of lettuce. "I thought maybe if I just kept quiet, it would get to a point where I could forget it happened. But that obviously backfired," she said with a weak smile. Bryce reached out and grasped one of her hands, which caused her to flinch - they were close, and had been for most of their lives. She hugged him often, for no apparent reason. They leaned on one another when they sat on the couch watching television. It wasn't that physical contact - Gwen would go so far as to call it affection - was stranger to them. But hand-holding, this strange, comforting gesture coming from him paired with the warmth in his eyes, was completely new and unfamiliar.

"We're gonna find Duggan," he said resolutely, and he was unable to comprehend the look of fear that flashed across his best friend's face. "We'll find him and make him pay for -"

"No - I don't want that. I don't want anyone to look for him," she said almost pleadingly. "I - I protected myself, he didn't get to do anything, and I just want him to stay gone. That's all."

Clearly unsatisfied with Gwen's attitude towards all of that she had been through and what was to be done about it, Bryce shook his head and sighed - whether he liked it or not, it was Gwen's call, and he simply had to resign.

"Fair enough. We'll talk about something else," he laughed weakly, but by the look on his face, he was struggling to find something else to talk about. He sat for a few moments, as though mulling something over very seriously, and Gwen had half the mind to get up and just see him again another time when tensions had died down, to make it easier on both of them. However, he finally managed to clear his throat. "How about we do dinner tonight? At a restaurant. Like - not at the house or anything," he said. Gwen smiled questioningly, raising her eyebrows - had it been that serious of a question to ask his best friend to have dinner out with him?

And then, she remembered what Will Caster had said to her when he was still just a face in the Psi - Bryce Waters possesses romantic intentions towards you. She gave a weak laugh and pretended not to have suspected anything. After all, if it had to be someone, there were worse choices than Bryce Waters, weren't there?

"I'm not sure I'm up to it yet today," she admitted honestly, looking down at her salad. "I'm just - I'm a little overwhelmed."

"Oh. Yeah, yeah - definitely. Of course, I have the worst timing -"

"Tomorrow?"

Bryce nearly choked on the sip of water he was taking - he certainly hadn't expected her to actually be looking forward to it. He swiped his shirt sleeve across his mouth to make sure he hadn't splashed all over himself, and she finally managed a real, genuine laugh.

"Tomorrow works," Bryce grinned, shaking his head in slight embarrassment. Gwen shot him another smile before getting up, meaning to go when he suddenly spoke up again. "Hey - Gwen, when you were at the house last night, did you overhear my dad talking to anyone?"

Gwen froze in her tracks and turned back to face him - so his path had already crossed Will's. She blinked and exhaled deeply, considering lying before finally nodding in confirmation. Bryce covered his face briefly with his hands and breathed through pursed lips. "You don't know - who that was?" he asked, shaking his head incredulously, his face a strange mix of worry and doubt. "Gwen, while you were sleeping at our place last night, there was a man there - did you see him?"

"No."

She moved over and sat down across from Bryce again so they could speak with low voices, leaning across the table and staring at him questioningly. He clearly didn't know about her connection to all of this - but he seemed to know something else. He glanced around, a ball of nervous energy, before adding in a near-whisper. "That's Will Caster - he was responsible for the Great Collapse. He used to be dad's… best friend."

And Gwen froze, her eyes wide with shock. She could tell right away that the pair had recognized each other, but she didn't bother to wonder how. But Bryce knew - Bryce knew more than she did, and he was perhaps the only one who could tell her. He was the only one who could make all of this make at least a little more sense. She attempted to return her expression to one of calm.

"...on second thought," she said, nodding gently. "Let's do that dinner tonight."

A/N's

I wasn't planning on writing many author's notes in this story, but I just wanted to take the opportunity to thank everyone for following, favoriting, and reviewing. I especially want to say thank you to Amber Entropy for her constructive feedback that the science jargon was a little heavy in the last chapter. I might go back and make an author's note somewhere with an explanation/glossary. I definitely felt like it was a lot as well, but I was also trying to come up with a believable way for someone to take over another person's body - I guess I got lost in the details a little bit! The rest of the story shouldn't require too much jargon, so hopefully I can avoid that pitfall from here on out!

Also, thank you to my other reviewers, linalove and Mistia, as well as my very first reviewer, Marvelgeek42. I'm hoping to keep up a pretty consistent updating schedule, so until next time, cheers!