Chapter Text
"So you're from the future?" Lockwood couldn't quite keep the skepticism out of his voice. They were in the basement, George rifling through his filing cabinet, the girl sitting at Robin's empty desk. Lockwood himself was standing nearby, observing.
"Yep." The mysterious girl swiveled back and forth in her office chair.
"Right."
Whatever expression she saw on his face amused her. "I know you don't believe me, Lockwood. You don't have to pretend."
George snorted from the filing cabinet, his head almost fully inside the drawer. Lockwood frowned. "You don't seem bothered."
She shrugged. "This isn't the first impossible thing I've asked you to believe. You'll come around."
"It's not necessarily that I don't believe you," he hedged. It was a lie, and somehow she seemed to know it. "I'm just processing. George apparently misplaces this document sometime in the future, and instead of heading to the Archives to make another copy, he invents time travel-"
"This information doesn't exist anywhere else," George called, his voice echoing in the metal cabinet.
"-and sends you back to get it?"
"That's about the size of it."
Why wouldn't he send me? "Is there a reason he didn't travel back himself? Surely that would have been easier."
The girl paused her swiveling. She looked as though she was choosing her words with great care. "I have a good track record with...strange psychical phenomena. Plus, there was someone else involved in the whole process, and he refused to work with anyone but me." She rolled her eyes. "Speaking of - George, I'm going to need to borrow the skull."
"Found it!" George disentangled himself from his files, a sheaf of paper in hand. "I'll copy it down for you, just give me a minute." He moved to his desk, shoving other books and papers aside in his search for a blank piece of paper.
"Alright then." Lockwood took a seat at his own desk. "What can you tell us about the future?"
"Nothing," she said bluntly. "George's orders. Future George, that is."
"Current George as well."
"Not even the name of that fencing move?"
She smiled at that. "You'll learn it. My Lockwood - future Lockwood - taught it to me."
Would he be a fencing instructor someday? It was strange to think of what might happen in the next year, or two, or ten. Most days Lockwood wasn't sure he'd live to see the next sunrise, and that didn't necessarily bother him. He had a feeling - almost like a premonition - that he'd burn bright, but short.
This girl was proof that he would live at least a while longer. Long enough to meet this fascinating stranger; long enough to teach her a very cool fencing move.
"Nothing else?" he probed. "How's the agency doing? Wildly successful, I imagine?"
"Haven't burned down any houses lately." Her tone was teasing, like this was some kind of inside joke he'd surely understand in due time.
He paused, trying to parse it out. "I suppose that's good."
"Lockwood, stop asking questions." George set down his pen. "Even the smallest discrepancy could destroy the space-time continuum. If you're not familiar with the butterfly effect, it's..."
But whatever else George said, it fell on deaf ears. The mysterious agent was leaning back in her chair, nodding along to George's monologue, her fingers sliding across a delicate chain around her neck. He hadn't noticed it before - but she was wearing a silver necklace with a small diamond pendant on it.
Jessica's necklace.
Moments from the evening flashed through Lockwood's mind in a blur. This girl, an agent, moving with confidence through his house in the dark. Disarming him with a move he would teach her. It's not breaking in if I live here. Her blush when he looked at her a moment too long. The way his disbelief didn't faze her. George was future George but he was my Lockwood. She had fascinated him from the first moment, which he assumed was due to the thrilling and unusual circumstances - but perhaps she would have fascinated him regardless of how they met.
George stood up, breaking Lockwood out of his thoughts. "You said you needed the skull?"
"Just briefly. It's a strong source of psychical energy, and I'll need that to get back." She stood and stretched, silver pendant resting on her shirt collar, unaware of Lockwood's revelation.
"I'll fetch it from my room." George handed her the paper before hurrying up the spiral staircase. Lockwood felt as though he was watching George's ascension from a great distance, eyes glued to the staircase until his housemate was completely out of sight.
"The Kuriashi Turn."
He turned back to the girl, startled. "What?"
"That's what the fencing move is called," she told him. "I know George wouldn't want me to tell you, but..." she shrugged.
Lockwood felt a surge of affection for her, as surprising as it was pleasant. "The Kuriashi Turn," he mused. "I'll keep an ear out for it." She beamed at him from where she was leaning against the spare desk, and the words tumbled out of him before he could think. "Your necklace."
"Oh." She looked almost guilty, tucking the silver chain back under her collar. "You probably weren't supposed to see that."
It was odd, how imminent mortal danger didn't scare him anymore - if anything, facing powerful Visitors on cases was the only time he truly felt alive. There were other things that scared him, things he tried not to think of. And sitting here, now, Lockwood was faced once again with the fear of loss. Sometime in the future, he would be brave.
Maybe he could be brave now.
He stood and took a step towards her. "I may not know you yet, but I know that necklace." He kept moving to her, as though drawn by an invisible string, stopping when there were inches between them. She looked up at him, hazel eyes wide, cheeks pink, her breathing shallow. But she did not move away. "And I know what it would mean to me to give it to you."
Slowly, he leaned down and pressed a kiss to her cheek. A shaky exhale brushed his ear as he straightened up again. Her blush had deepened, and he found it endlessly endearing. They stared at each other a moment until the elephantine stomping of George's feet signaled his return.
Lockwood stepped back, learning against his desk. The girl sat down heavily, covering her red cheeks with her hands.
"Here we are," George said, oblivious to the tension in the air. He set the skull jar down on his desk. "So," he said, eyes shining, "exactly how does this work?"
Somewhere in the Future
"Should she be back by now?"
"For god's sake, Lockwood, stop pacing." George was sitting on the couch making notes, the skull glowing faintly on the coffee table.
Lockwood huffed, but came to a stop. "Are you sure you know what you're doing?"
"You're asking me this now?"
He threw himself into his armchair. "We shouldn't have risked Lucy on this," he muttered, running a hand through his hair. "I should have been the one to go."
"The Skull would have stranded you in the past. You know he doesn't like anyone but Lucy - she's the only one of us he'd see fit to return safely."
"I thought you said we just needed it as an energy source." Lockwood leapt up and resumed his pacing. "What if it has too much sway in what happens? What if-?"
There was a blinding flash of green light, and when Lockwood's vision cleared, Lucy was sitting on the couch next to George. "Glad that worked," she remarked.
"Luce! Thank goodness." Lockwood didn't even try to hide his relief. "Are you alright?"
Her face was bright pink - probably an effect of the interdimensional travel, or whatever it was George kept saying. They should probably get her looked at by a doctor, just in case she suffered any adverse affects. "Fine," she said, slumping back on the couch. "Knackered, though."
"That's to be expected," George told her, scribbling in his notebook with increasing speed. "How did it go?"
Lucy glanced over at Lockwood, who was able to sit down again now that she was home, her fingers ghosting over the necklace he'd given her. "It went very well, I think."
"So you didn't wake us up?"
"What?" Her face fell. "Oh. Um, actually I did wake up both of you."
"You just said it went well!"
"I got what you asked for, didn't I?" She pulled a folded piece of paper out of her pocket and threw it at George. "It's not a big deal."
"Not a big deal?!" George spluttered. "You have no idea what the consequences of that will be! Things may have already changed! Reality could be crumbling as we speak!"
Lucy's stomach grumbled. "Speaking of crumbling, do we have any biscuits?"
Lockwood fetched a package for her, and to everyone's surprise, George told her not to worry about the biscuit rule. "There's no telling what effect this will have on your body. Besides, you're going to be stuck here answering my questions for the next few hours, so you may as well eat."
"Hours? Don't be ridiculous!"
"Did you use the fail-safe?"
Lucy sighed, snapping a biscuit in half. "Yes, I remembered all of your numbers."
"Fail-safe?" Lockwood asked.
"I knew there was a possibility we would wake up, so I gave Lucy a secret code to use to let my past self know that he should help her."
"And he did," Lucy confirmed. "Once I remembered it."
"What about me?" Lockwood asked. "I didn't give you too much trouble, did I, Luce?"
She snorted. "You thought I'd broken into your house and challenged me to a duel." Her smile was smug. "But I won."
George paused his writing. "You beat him?"
"I figured past Lockwood wouldn't know the Kuriashi turn yet. So I used it straight out, disarmed him right away."
If it had been anyone else, Lockwood would not have liked that one bit. But it was Lucy. "That's excellent thinking, Luce. I'm sure the look on my face was something to see."
Her face was getting pink again. Lockwood considered grabbing the first aid kit to take her temperature. "Sure was," she mumbled, taking a bite of her biscuit.
George tapped his pen on the table impatiently. "Start at the beginning, Lucy. And don't leave anything out."
Somewhere in the Past
Lockwood checked the clock on the mantle. "Our first candidate should get here in the next few minutes."
"Right." George had been preoccupied all morning, and he removed his glasses once more to polish them. "Say, Lockwood, do you remember that girl?"
"What girl?" Lockwood was fixing his hair in the mirror. It never hurt to make a good first impression, something George didn't seem to understand, considering he was wearing jeans and a flannel.
"The one from the future."
Lockwood spun around. "What about her?"
"I think...well. I shouldn't say."
"George Casper Karim, I swear-"
"Alright!" George put his glasses back on. "It's only...I think this is when we meet her."
Lockwood's heart was racing. Was it normal for his palms to be this sweaty? "Now? As in, this first interview?"
"An interview," he clarified. "Think about it - we know she's an agent, but she didn't wear a uniform. We're the only agency in the country that doesn't have a uniform. Plus, she knew the layout of the house, and she knew us."
My Lockwood. "And you think we'll meet her today?"
"I don't know," George admitted. "But if I had to guess, I'd say she's the Listener we end up hiring. Just to be clear, whenever we do meet her, we cannot let slip that we've met a future version of her. I mean it, Lockwood. We have to behave as normally as possible."
"Normal, got it," Lockwood said breezily, even though he felt anything but. "My specialty. You'll need to put in some work, though."
By the time their final candidate ran screaming from the house, Lockwood was losing hope. Maybe George was wrong. He could wait longer, surely. Just a little longer. Lockwood sighed and stood, returning to the paperwork he'd left on the mantle.
"You were right," George's voice said from behind him. "There's one more."
"No, that was the last one. I checked."
"Then who's this?"
Lockwood turned, and there she was. The agent from the future, standing in his living room. She looked slightly younger, hair a little shorter, lacking the same blunt confidence she would find working at his agency. Behind her, George was mouthing the word NORMAL.
He cleared his throat."I'm Anthony Lockwood."
"Lucy Carlyle," she said. "I don't have an appointment, but I saw your advert in the paper."
Lucy. His smile ignited. "Welcome to Lockwood and Co., Miss Carlyle. Please, have a seat. Has George offered you tea?"