Chapter Text
There had been a moment in 1989 when a switch flicked for Edwin. They’d been tracking a spirit that was haunting the tunnels of the Piccadilly line. Railway hauntings were not uncommon: lost souls often stayed bound to their approximate place of death, and those whose deaths were self inflicted tended to have unfinished businesses. Both of them hated these cases. There was never a happy ending to be found. But they had to take them on to avoid an ending much worse - this particular ghost had been creating flashes of light deep in the tunnels, distracting the drivers. There’d been three narrowly avoided crashes in the last week alone, and it was only a matter of time before a more serious incident occurred.
They’d been lured further into the tunnel than they would have liked - somewhere between Hounslow and Heathrow, if Edwin’s memory served. After tracking this ghost for hours, they were both getting antsy. There was no way of telling, this deep underground, whether dawn had broken. If the first train of the day came…well, there was no way they’d get out in time. They couldn’t just phase through it: there was plenty enough iron in a London Underground train to take them both out, and very unpleasantly at that. Their only hope was to talk down the spirit and get through the other side of the tunnel as quickly as possible.
Step one went just fine. They found the ghost - a young man who hadn’t known he’d been causing any harm. He’d died after his little brother had fallen onto the tracks. Heroically, he’d jumped down to rescue him. The boy had survived - Edwin had checked later - but his rescuer had been too slow climbing up. For weeks since his death, he’d been wandering the tunnels with a torch, looking for his baby brother.
Theyd managed to reconcile him with his death, and he was safely on the other side of the tunnel, as it were. Edwin and Charles, not so much. They kept walking and walking along the track, but there was no sign of the approaching station - nowhere they could duck into to avoid a train. The both of them were panting - running, now, rather than walking, but still nothing. Edwin swore he could feel the tunnel getting narrower around him, and the anxiety was near paralysing.
And then -
A light, reflecting off the curve in the tunnel in front of them.
For one blissful moment, Edwin thought it must be the light from Hounslow station. But then he heard the rumbling, felt the tunnel start to shake.
Oh, God. It was over for them. Really over, this time. For both of them.
Oh God. Charles was going straight to Heaven, no doubt about it. If he didn’t make the cut, Edwin defied Death herself to find someone who was worthy. And Edwin would be back in Hell, running for his life every minute of every day forever. And surely it would be worse this time: now he knew what he was missing.
That was the moment the switch flicked, because he thought, with startling clarity as light flooded the tunnel and the tracks screamed at metal on metal, that now, he knew what love was.
Charles had grasped his hand. Edwin could remember his expression perfectly, lit by the all-eclipsing white of the oncoming train - not scared, even, but set. Sure. No regrets, he’d said. Edwin, who’d been scared out of his wits a moment earlier, saw solace in his friend’s eyes. No regrets, he’d said back. And for the first time in his existence, life or afterlife, he’d meant it. Love you, mate, Charles had said - or Edwin thought he’d heard it, but the sound of the train was defeaning. Edwin didn’t shut his eyes,though he had to fight against the impulse; he wanted to keep Charles in sight, if he was the last thing he was ever to see.
And then, Charles had yanked him across the tracks - so close that Edwin felt the train phase through the heel of his brogues - and through a metal hatch he hadn’t even noticed. They fell, Edwin squarely on top of Charles, into some sort of service shaft and laughed until they cried.
That was over forty years ago, now.
Still, Edwin thought about it frequently. He did sometimes need a reminder of what it was all about, why he was still here - when he felt wrung out, when he saw the same sort of bullying that got him and Charles killed, still going on today, when he thought too much about his family and Charles’. He reminded himself that it was about love. It was about Charles. And, God, of course it was worth it.
And so, he could never regret the life they had carved out together.
But neither could he deny that those same memories, those same reminders, weren’t holding quite as strong these days.
With Charles otherwise occupied, Edwin was spending more and more of his time with Niko and Monty. It wasn’t a bad thing: he loved Niko, and Monty was becoming a true friend. But ever since Charles had told him about the kiss, he’d felt burdened - both with a knowledge of himself he hadn’t asked for, and a fear that Charles was moving towards a place Edwin couldn’t join him.
What would he be without Charles? It didn’t bear thinking about. He wasn’t so dramatic as to say he might as well be in Hell - but his afterlife would certainly be very different. Crystal was a highly intelligent person - and, more than that, a truly good person: no doubt, she would want to leave Devon eventually. To see London, or go back to her family. To find her place in the world, somewhere she could make a real difference. And when Charles followed her, what would Edwin do? Trail along? Stay behind? Strike out on his own?
He didn’t want to think of it. Edwin had never liked change. He would’ve happily stayed in London forever, solving crimes with Charles, had the Night Nurse not threatened them with separate afterlives. And now that he was in Devon, living with his best friend and never far from Niko or Crystal, he was loath to give it up.
So, yes, it was all about love, all about Charles.
But what if Charles’ love took him away from Edwin?
What then?