I didn't know how long it took them to rebuild the A.R.C.

Months.

It didn't seem fair that everyone else got to go back and get on with their lives like nothing had happened.

I kept the blinds shut, the doors closed, kept out of the corridors during the day.

I'd found myself standing in front of the lockers in the hallway and lost an hour, zoned out, trying not to cry.

Most of the days in the labs went by just the same.

I turned my head to the corner of my office. He was there, sitting in his faded red chair behind that old wooden desk from his university office. His hair had been shorter back then, sort of spiky, pushed back from his face. He looked up, saw me, and smiled, taking a bite from the apple in his hand and ignoring the way the juice ran down his chin.

I shut my eyes.

I was only pulled out that trance when the detector's alarm sounded overhead and I slowly opened my eyes again.

'The unfortunate reality, Miss Havisham,' Lester said, 'is that you are the best person to lead this team. '

Lester didn't know how to look at me. Before, he always used to just sit in his chair when we spoke to him, and never looked us in the eye, because whatever he could see out the window was a lot more interesting.

Now, he stood opposite me, behind his desk, and didn't look away from my face. But I just kept my attention on my shoes.

'You have the experience,' he continued, 'the knowledge, you're more than capable of doing it.'

When I shook my head, he shifted awkwardly. Irony of it was that he probably felt worse right now than I did.

Sorry for me.

So sorry for me that he was probably in physical pain when I was just numb.

I heard him exhale tryingly. 'I get it–'

'No. You don't.' And as a long and uncomfortable silence settled over him– because I couldn't feel anything– I heard my own voice playing it back in my head. That wasn't right. I swallowed. 'Sorry.'

Lester shook his head. 'No, I'm sorry, Miss Havisham. About everything,' he said so kindly that it made me feel even worse about it, 'I am so, so sorry.'

There were footsteps along the corridor, shaped moved behind the frosted doors in the corner of my eye. One of them stopped. The doors slid open and Connor came inside.

'We've got an anomaly,' he said.

I couldn't bring myself to look at him. I stared down just past the edge of my desk at a plain white tile on the floor.

'Um, Jensen's…'

'Ryan.'

Jensen frowned. 'My names not Ryan.'

'No, no, I know,' Nick mumbled in response, 'you think your name's Jensen Lewis but you're actually a man called Tom Ryan. Captain Ryan. There's a good reason for this, and I–' He looked back at me over his shoulder. 'We can explain this…'

'Yes,' Lester drawled, 'meet professor Nick Cutter, the fascinating study of the tipping point between inspiration and lunacy.'

'I know this sounds insane,' Nick continued, 'but you're a man called Tom Ryan. Anna–'

'Yeah,' I said in his defence

'Something happened,' Nick said, his voice raising as his anger overtook him, 'something changed while we were in the anomaly. The world evolved differently. Anna's back, now you remember, but we never met Oliver Leek, we've never been to this place before, and that man's name–' The shout echoed through the empty space as he pointed an accusing finger at Jensen, 'is Tom Ryan.'

'Are you…?' Connor's tentative voice came through.

I slowly shook my head. I wasn't going with them.

'Okay… Thought you might want to know,' he said, 'it was some sort of false alarm, or something. There was a woman,' he continued softly, 'seemed to know all about us. And the anomalies. Oh, and someone broke into Jensen's car.'

What? I frowned, slowly bringing my head around to him. I must have missed an entire hour. It felt like he hadn't even left the room.

At that moment his phone started to ring, and as he pulled it out his pocket his eyes widened.

'I have to–' He cut himself off, stepped back out into the corridor before I could even register how weirdly he was behaving. He slid the door closed behind him and I saw the shadow of his figure against the screen as he started off down the hallway. 'I told you never to call– what do you mean you're back?'

But his voice faded out of range, my attention drifted completely away from me again and I wandered.

The alarm went off a little while later. There was a stampede of people down the hallway but this time no one stopped at my door.

The silence that followed was astounding. I sat there, so very aware of it and myself, just wondering how the complete lack of sound could be so deafening.

I tried to return my focus to my work.

There were pages scattered all over my desk, singed to a variable degree. And I tried to use whatever parts of the equations I could read to complete the rest of the work.

The numbers all floated up from the page.

'Sweetheart, you need to concentrate.'

'Well then you need to be quiet.'

I could feel his breath as he leant on his elbows on the other side of my desk. My eyes remained locked onto the paper before me, because I couldn't look up, I didn't want to, I didn't want to look into his eyes and be reminded already of everything I'd just lost.

Him.

He was already everywhere. It was all some sick joke. I couldn't forget about it even for a second because everywhere I looked there he was so I had no respite from it, except in those moments where reality seemed to melt away into the numbness and I just existed as a form, an empty shell because everything inside my mind had just gone somewhere.

My jaw started to go, I could feel it, and to quell the shakes I sucked in my cheeks and bit down hard.

I repeated the mantra in my head. I am not going to break. I am not going to break.

My eyelids flickered, eyes sheening over until everything was blurry.

'Don't cry, Anna, I'm right here.'

I blinked, the tears ran down my cheeks as finally I pushed myself up, bringing my gaze from the sheet to the back wall of the office.

'No…' I just about managed to whisper. 'No, you're not.'

I got up off the chair and made for the door before I even realised, I was moving.

'I can't do it!' I said, voice cracking as I threw his office door open and stumbled in.

From the other side of his desk, Lester's head snapped up to me and his eyes widened.

'Miss Havisham–'

'I can't do this without him, I've tried but I can't.'

He was immediately on his feet, making his way around desk towards me, and I didn't know why, I didn't know if he wanted to hug me or touch me or what but I didn't want that, I didn't want sympathy so I took a big step back and held out my hand to instruct him to stay away.

My attention shifted to the window where, downstairs, the people in the hub had all stopped what they were doing whether it was mending equipment or rebuilding the benches and were all staring up at me.

I doubted they even knew I was here.

I hadn't seen any of them since it happened. There had been a memo. Connor had told me about it ahead of time so I didn't have to find out any other way.

It was better than having to explain, but the idea of them all thinking about me like that made me want to die.

'Everyone knows,' I continued in distress, 'everyone's looking at me. They feel sorry for me. I can't…'

'I can't let you go,' Lester returned calmly, 'everything we're doing here… we need you.'

I just shook my head again. Don't cry– don't cry don't cry don't cry don't cry don't cry.

'You don't have to do anything that you don't want to do,' he said. 'Jensen will… Jensen's taken charge until we can…' He didn't finish his sentence. He didn't want to upset me.

Until we can find a replacement.

Because that's all he was to them.

Your death doesn't mean anything to them except a pile of paperwork and the inconvenience of a few interviews.

'Please, Anna. You can't go.' His voice was soft, sort of tentative like he wasn't sure how I'd take it, except it was the words themselves he was having the trouble with and I realised he wasn't afraid of upsetting me– he was upset. He was grieving too.

This time as he took a step forward, I didn't retreat.

He had cared about us more than just the people who worked here, for him, with him…

I blew out a long breath, eyes glazing over again, but I tried not to let the tears fall from my eyes. 'How?' I asked, 'how am I supposed to do this now?'

There wasn't an answer. I knew that. I wasn't supposed to get over Nick's death because there isn't a way to do that. I turned on my heel, ignoring anything else that came from his mouth as I started quickly back out office and down the ramp.

I couldn't stay here.

I made straight for the hallway, bursting through the hub doors and went to my locker for my jacket. I ripped it down from the hanger, not bothering to put it on because I'd only needed the keys from my pocket, and slammed the door shut.

That was when I saw it.

I felt my breath hitch in my throat, my eyes widening as they became immovable from the nametag on the locker next to mine.

Nick Cutter.

No.

No no no no no no no.

I couldn't breathe.

My trembling hand came up in front of me and started to reach out to touch it. Just before my fingers could make contact, I pulled back and sealed my hand over my mouth.

'Anna?'

There was no way to know how long I'd been there for. Because Connor was back and it was obvious that he wasn't just surprised to see me standing there from the other end of the hallway, because he'd never run faster than he had in that moment when my legs buckled.

He had to skid down, catching me in his arms just before I hit the ground, and I was between his legs and cradled against him when the tears finally started again.

This time they were silent, my body shook almost violently like I was completely broken from it, but there wasn't a single noise that passed my lips except the tiniest gasps or exhalations.

He wrapped his body right around me, shielding me from anyone and anything who was out there. And he said nothing until I finally went limp.

'Here you go.' His voice brought my attention up from the floor of the kitchenette as he passed me a mug of tea- still wasn't drinking coffee. Couldn't face the idea that maybe all that internal complaining I'd done about being pregnant might have had something to do with the miscarriage.

I looked at him, smiled a weak thank you, and brought the cup towards my chest as I leant back against the worktop and tried to keep my eyes on him so I didn't zone out again.

'Are you leaving?' he questioned fearfully. Leaving the A.R.C– he meant– for good. Getting a job as something somewhere else. Trying to have a normal life.

How could I? 'No,' I managed to respond, 'it would feel like… abandoning him.' His memory. His work. His legacy.

'He'd understand,' Connor answered, he took a step forward and leant against the worktop, facing me. 'If it was what you wanted…'

He would.

But it wasn't. I shook my head.

I heard him inhale a shaky breath. 'Anna,' he started, and I knew it was serious, 'you know I was there… when he…'

I swallowed.

Died.

I took a deep breath and nodded, watching the way his eyes started to tear up.

'He told me to tell you– I couldn't before–'

'It's okay,' I interrupted. 'It's okay,' I said, 'I know.'

He nodded, trying to exhale to steady the sorrow accumulating inside him. A brief laugh burst from him– completely forced– in an attempt to make us both feel better.

Chewing on my lip, attention moving off down the corridor because there was something I wanted to say to get it off my chest no matter how difficult it would be for the both of us. 'I was going to call the baby Tommy,' I said quietly.

'…it was a boy?'

I realised I hadn't even told Connor that.

I hadn't told either of them.

I'd known in the hospital and lied about it so Nick hadn't even known he was going to have a son.

'After our friend,' I continued distractedly, 'and after a man who saved Nick's life and then was forgotten… Tommy Jackson…' I saw Connor's mouth open out the corner of my eye, and I couldn't tell if it was in shock or what or he was about to say something about it, but I didn't give him the chance. 'I know it's weird–' I admitted.

'It's not weird,' he replied quickly, 'it's completely understandable. Completely–' he repeated, '–normal.'

'But…' my voice just trailed off.

I should have told Nick. I should have told Nick everything, about the baby, about me, about my past, but I hadn't and there was nothing I could do about it now.

That idea seemed crazy at the time.

Irrelevant.

Because why would I bring that up? But I realised now I wanted him to have known it. It felt like I'd kept secrets. I raised the tea to my lips.

Get out of your head.

'He wasn't the only one who had something to say to you.'

The flood of anger was the first real feeling I'd felt for weeks. 'Helen.'

Connor made a short and pained noise of agreement. 'Yeah,' he said, 'she wanted me to say… she wanted me to tell you princess. I had to clean the slate.'

I bit down on the inside of my cheek. 'I've heard that before.'

'Are you coming home tonight?'

Home.

I hadn't been back to my house since before. Connor had asked Sarah to go and pick me some clothes up, sort out the stuff in the fridge and the bins. I couldn't face it.

I still couldn't.

I'd been staying with Connor ever since my discharge from the hospital.

I shook my head. 'I'm gonna stay here,' I told him, 'there's … so much that I have to do. Haven't managed to get anything done yet today. Why?'

He shook his head before he even said anything, which was suspicious. 'No reason,' he said quickly, 'just…' His head dropped as he nodded– more to himself than to me. 'Wondered…' I saw a smear of blood in his hair, and I slammed the mug down on the worktop as I suddenly grabbed the back of his neck to keep him there. 'Ow! A,' he complained.

'The hell happened to you?' .

He pulled himself firmly out my grasp. 'I'm fine,' he said reassuringly, 'the medic already checked it. I got locked in a hangar with Jensen.'

'And you tried to what… headbutt your way out?'

He rolled his eyes. 'I tried to kick the door down.'

'Connor!'

'You do it all the time!' he replied.

True. But apparently, I knew what I was doing. I lifted an eyebrow. 'Was his company really that bad?'

'You should have seen him out there,' he said, 'giving the orders… pointing and shouting, it was… weird. Danny wouldn't hear a word of it.'

I frowned. 'Danny?' I repeated like it was a member of personnel here that I thought I should have known but couldn't remember.

'Danny Quinn,' Connor clarified.

'Danny Quinn?' What the hell was Danny Quinn doing at an anomaly site in an airport.

As though he could read my mind Connor continued 'ever since the house he'd been interested in our work apparently. He asked me where "the one who was really in charge" was.' My breath hitched again at the thought of Nick's absence but seemingly understanding where my brain had gone Connor quickly shook his head. 'He meant you, Anna.'

My mouth opened, like I genuinely meant to respond but just didn't.

Connor glanced down at his watch and winced. He put his hands on my shoulders. 'Okay, you gonna be alright, A?'

He must have somewhere to be. Strange. Connor didn't have a social life.

It didn't matter.

I nodded my head.

'Alright.' He leant in and kissed my forehead. 'See you tomorrow then.'

'Aye, yeah,' I echoed with a weak smile, 'see you tomorrow.' And once he was out of sight, I picked up my cup of tea and went back to my lab.