Chapter Text
Henry glanced over worriedly at his ally. The man in question happened to be in an even worse shape than normal, due to barely surviving his latest close shave with an early death. Henry had done his best to patch him up but despite being a genius, he was a doctor of technology, not medicine. Besides, his small lab wasn’t exactly sterile and he simply didn’t have the supplies needed to keep bringing his only friend back from the brink of death.
As if sensing his worry, his comrade sat up on the small camp bed, where he’d been resting, and gave Henry a reassuring, yet also mischievous smile.
“Found him yet Doc?” he asked.
Henry sighed. He had located the next possible suspect as his friend had slept, but he just didn’t want to admit it. He knew that the moment he told his friend the new information he had managed to piece together, he would jump into action instantly. He needed more time to rest and recover. However, Henry had never been a good liar.
“Yes and no,” he hazarded, hoping to delay his friend’s latest journey until at least the next day. However, it was pointless; his friend was already standing up. He saw the brief flash of pain across his friend’s face – probably caused by his barely healed bruised ribs – before he could hide it. Henry quickly added, “I want to run more tests and scans first before you check it out, though.
“There’s no reason for you to run straight back into danger,” he continued, “at least not until I’ve done some more research. I want to be sure that this isn’t another fausse piste[1]. There’s no point in you risking jumping out at some poor random guy from the past yet again. We don’t need to give the Time Patrol another reason or chance to catch you, do we?”
“It’ll be fine,” the other man said reassuringly, reaching for his time machine and strapped it to his wrist. That cheeky smile of his was really annoying at times, Henry reflected. “When and where is he?”
“Just give me a few more hours to check everything,” Henry pleaded. “I don’t want you walking into another trap.”
Technically, Henry didn’t actually have a doctorate but it wasn’t his fault that he’d been born in the wrong time period. If he’d been alive in Earth’s golden age, Henry knew he would have been a world famous scientist. It was just a shame that, despite his intelligence, his friend never listened to his advice.
“When and where, Henry?” he said in a voice that held no argument and Henry knew he’d lost.
“Paris, Buttes-Chaumont Park, 30th April 2014, 1:13pm,” he said in a defeated voice as his friend typed in the spatial-temporal coordinates while he spoke, “but I really think you should…” There was a flash of light as his friend disappeared, leaving him alone in his small lab, “Annnnnd he’s gone,” he said rolling his eyes.
“Abruti[2],” he muttered to the empty room, shaking his head, “one of these days you’ll get yourself killed but no doubt you’ll still find a way to make my life difficult from beyond the grave.”
The raggedy, beaten man reached for the button to activate his time machine before Dr. Henry Castafolte could try to talk him out of it anymore. What his friend didn’t seem to understand was that he couldn’t just sit around the lab waiting. He needed to be out doing something or he would go mad.
Besides, he knew his friend was only stalling for time. When it came down to it, Henry could spend as long as he wanted trying to confirm his suspicions but neither of them would know anything for certain until one of them had checked. He for one wasn’t going to sit around waiting.
‘Is the word ‘friend’ right for someone like Henry?’ he wondered, as he pressed the button. Then he shrugged to himself. If someone like Henry really could feel true emotions, then he was almost sure that Henry thought of him as a friend.
After that, all clear thoughts started to disintegrate, his body braking down instead and his consciousness being stretched out, like it was dragged backwards. In reality he knew that the journey was almost instantaneous. However, from a subjective viewpoint, the moment of travel always seemed to slow down to what felt like an eternity as he headed towards the event horizon.
The world crystallised into a frozen moment where the present actually meant something; a physical thing or place you could visit or leave, unconnected to the past or the future (or maybe it was one and the same with them).
Then he was heading away from they event horizon and time came crashing back again. His form reassembled itself as his consciousness was returned to its proper place within his physical body.
For a moment, he half ran and half fell forwards in one ungainly movement as he tried to catch his balance. Then he righted himself and looked around. He froze as he caught sight of a man he recognised. The man was standing by a bench, where his two friends were sat watching him, as he prepared to throw an empty can into a nearby bin.
He knew instantly that they had finally found the one they’d been looking for. He recognised the man from the newspaper cutting he’d read and reread a million times. With the help of Henry, they’d both searched for this man for over a year. He’d almost given up hope of ever finding him, but it was really him.
For a moment he considered going back (technically forward) for a gun. It would be so easy to end everything now and kill the man to ensure he never fulfilled his destiny. However, the moment passed. There were better ways to save the world.
‘I might as well start by changing something small,’ he decided. That way, when he was done, he could go back to the future (his present) and see if he’d had any effect on the timelines.
“No!” he yelled. “Don’t throw that can!”
Footnotes-
[1] 'Fausse piste' is the French version of the English phrase ‘wild goose chase’
[2] Abruti is French for Moron