Chapter Text
“Because everything that begins must end. What causes us to suffer is not in the past or the future: it is here, now, in our memory, in our expectations. We long for timelessness, we endure the passing of time: we suffer time. Time is suffering.”
— from L’ordine del tempo (or ‘The Order of Time’) by Carlo Rovelli, 2017
[1985-1993]
Mycroft was two weeks shy of turning 13 when he first met Greg, under the portico of the National Gallery.
Greg, to Mycroft, had then been just an anonymous gentleman, kind enough to offer his umbrella to a youngster trapped by the rain.
“Doesn’t seem to be stopping any time soon,” he’d remarked, with the apologetic air of someone taking responsibility for the British weather, probably having noticed the way Mycroft had been frowning at his watch, “Sorry, didn’t mean to startle you. D’you want to take this? Short daylight hours now. Best not travel in the dark, yeah?”
Mycroft was more than old enough to be vigilant when walking alone after dusk, but he did need to hurry back — he’d promised to watch over his siblings in the evening. He should not have lingered in the gallery for as long as he did, should’ve resisted the compulsion to complete that final sketch. And he was not normally so careless as to be caught in the elements unprepared.
He looked up at the man (a police officer, perhaps, he now observed), thanking him for the kind gesture, and glanced down, hesitant.
“No worries, kid. Here,” he put the umbrella up, reassuring Mycroft with an easy smile, “I’ve got time to wait it out. Not in a rush to be anywhere.”
His smile was warm, and one that Mycroft would not forget.
*
Carrying the classic black umbrella, neatly furled through most of his journey home, had given Mycroft an unexpected sense of maturity. Confidence, even. And the wooden handle was calming to grip on the bustling train.
Mycroft treated it with care, and remembered to take it with him whenever he visited London again. It was quite improbable, statistically, given the city’s size and population — as his mind, ever mathematically inclined, would promptly remind him — but in case, just in case..
*
Coincidences did occur, after all.
He was tutoring for a family in Hampstead one weekend — friends of his parents, who had a child due to sit the entrance assessment for Eton. With the remainder of the day to himself, and central London a short Underground ride away, it was an opportunity not to be forgone.
Mycroft had spent some time in front of Sebastiano del Piombo’s The Raising of Lazarus, and was about to move on to another piece when he spotted the man across the room, who was studying the caption to a Bronzino painting1.
He had more silvered hair than in Mycroft’s memory, and looked older by five years at least, but recognition struck instantly, along with a sense of trepidation, and amidst it, anticipation.
The man broke into a friendly grin as he saw Mycroft approach, which was much more than Mycroft had hoped for as reaction to being disturbed by an awkward teen, and he appeared only mildly surprised when Mycroft held out the borrowed umbrella.
Cheeks warming, Mycroft expressed his thanks, courteously as a young man like him should be.
“Call me Greg,” the man responded, a shine in his eyes, “Even at work I’m only sometimes ‘Sir’d. And you can keep it, if you’d like.. It’s yours.”
They ended up walking together — through the next adjoining rooms in the gallery, before strolling outside, across Trafalgar Square, and into St James’s Park. They talked about the National Gallery’s collection. About London, and its landmarks; its museums (Mycroft was particularly delighted to learn that Greg had shared his fondness for the Natural History Museum).
It was a sunless day, the end of an exacting week. And when Mycroft returned home later, those familial problems they’d been having would still not be okay. Yet by the time he had bid Greg farewell, Mycroft felt unexpectedly refreshed, and that bit more positive about the days that lay ahead.
*
There were multiple things — potential clues — he noted on that second encounter, but it was not until after the third that Mycroft acquired enough confidence about his hypothesis. Stress and fatigue might have a visible impact on senescence, but surely nothing could cause ageing and de-ageing to such an effect, within a timescale of a few months.
Greg was a time traveller. From sometime in the future, judging by aspects of his attire and manner of speech. Though he did not seem to have any more power dictating the time and place of their meetings than Mycroft himself.
Unlike his younger brother, Mycroft had known to be conscious of his spoken words ever since he first taught himself to deduce. He broached the subject carefully, polite and allusive, compelled by curiosity, by fascination, and perhaps a level of trust more than he ought to place on a strange man he barely knew.
The warm brown gaze regarded him with apparent intrigue, “Go on then, tell me what else you’ve deduced about me.”
Mycroft did, and was pleased to have clearly impressed Greg (“Brilliant, Mycroft! Truly.”). He listened attentively as Greg explained the couple of aspects he had overlooked, showing Mycroft further pieces of information he might’ve inferred — if one factored in certain other generalisations.
It was quite amazing, the insights Greg was able to offer. Mycroft was more than a little awed, and permitted it to tinge his reaction. It was seldom he felt this specific brand of respect any more, frequently proving his knowledge and ability to be above the level of any academic curriculum set for him.
Greg merely chuckled, ruffling his hair. “Experience, is all. Can’t be a copper for twenty-five years and learn nothing, ey? And well,” Greg added, a hint of what might be fondness crinkling his eyes, “I’ve had some pointers myself. From the very best.”
*
By age 14, Mycroft had met Greg — mostly an older Greg, who was maybe from different time points in his forties — on several more occasions.
“Sorry for the erratic schedule,” Greg had indicated his regret as he greeted Mycroft by the Thames once, the Tower Bridge within view, “I don’t choose where I get sent to, or when, and I’ve got no say over how long I’m staying, either. Bit rubbish, isn’t it? Astonishing really, that I still keep running into you, somehow.” Thus confirming Mycroft’s conjecture.
“I do like to think this isn’t just the universe being lazy,” he had heard Greg remark, quietly, and seemingly rather to himself, his gaze far away.
Mycroft was not entirely certain of its relevance, but he could agree with the expression nonetheless. There was a reason behind everything, if not always for a purpose.
Despite his normal penchant for planning, for remaining organised and prepared, Mycroft looked forward to the unexpected meetings nonetheless, and found himself in irrational anticipation each time he had cause to be in London. Anticipation, at the prospect of spotting the familiar silver hair somewhere, in the crowd or across the street, of yet another chance to sit beside the man with gentle eyes and encouraging words.
The man who, as Mycroft became increasingly aware, was also more handsome than any other Mycroft had seen.
*
“Hey.. You worrying yourself over something again, kiddo? You can ask, you know.. Anything you’d like to know, I’ll answer if I can, hm?” Since when had Greg been able to read Mycroft so well?
“How..” Mycroft hesitated over the phrasing of his question, “How often are occurrences like these, for you?” Have you met many other people in this way, from different times? Spoken with them, spent a half-hour together, maybe up to two hours, once in a while, like we do?
“The time-travelling, you mean? Not very. Started when I was..about your age, actually. Once or twice a year. Never more than five.”
“And..were there any patterns about them, that you could discern? The time and place?” Will there be a time, my time, when you..simply no longer visited? Will that time be..soon?
“It used to vary a lot more. Somewhere new every time, pretty much. But it’s always been in London, in the past — my past. And I’d usually end up being able to..help with something. Somewhere.. But then, that’s just how this world is, isn’t it? People in need, all the time. People who help each other, and those who..do harm, in one circumstance or another. Crimes take place every day. It’s..how I decided I wanted to join the Met.”
A pause, a small smile, before Greg continued, “But that’s probably a story for another day. Going back to your question — recent years, on the other hand.. Well, yeah, there’s been a pattern with the travels all right. Seems someone hasn’t grown too sick of running into me yet, ey?”
Mycroft was not ready to admit how opposite from the truth that suggestion had been, and chose to comment on the other point that had drawn his attention instead:
“You..travel through time and space, helping people.” It was true, then. Greg really was. A light where there was shadow. Where even those who weren’t wanderers might be lost. Those like..Mycroft.
Greg merely laughed. A rumbling sound, distinctly pleasant to Mycroft’s ears.
“I’m not The Doctor, Mycroft, if that’s what you’re implying. No TARDIS parked away somewhere, promise,” he joked. Mycroft recognised the reference. Perhaps he might start watching the show.
“And..” Greg began carefully, his expression more serious, “There’s an order to time as we know it, I suppose. You can’t — retrospectively — prevent something bad from happening, if it was going to happen. That’s still in sci-fi only. You can only try and lessen the suffering. Contain the damage.. Rectify the wrong..”
“Or ensure precautions were already in place,” Mycroft offered, “Contingency planning, as much as is possible. Sufficiently in advance. Sufficiently..large scale; universal.. The law. National and international security.” He added, thoughtful.
Greg smiled again. “Yeah. That.”
*
When left undisturbed, Mycroft generally read. History, science, and philosophy — he appreciated their broadening of his perspective, and enjoyed challenging himself to think. He was more selective with fiction, though was partial to a suspenseful story.
Poetry was not amongst Mycroft’s more well-acquainted subjects, and it was Greg who first planted in his mind the enduring words of J. Rudyard Kipling2, words he would find himself revisiting time and again:
If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting…
“You’re a good lad, Mycroft,” Greg had told him, his voice an anchor in a sea of unknowns, “You’re going to be a great man. Give it time.”
*
Mycroft didn’t have friends, and meeting Greg.. Meeting Greg in those uneasy years, as the weight of Mycroft’s responsibilities became heavier to bear, as he sought to find his way, carrying secrets and doubts, was a kindness Mycroft never expected the universe to bestow.
He did not know how far into his own future that Greg would continue to meet him. If Greg had seen in person the man that Mycroft would become. There were things they did not talk about, though not by any spoken agreement.
The world Mycroft had yet to experience, for instance; England in twenty or thirty years’ time, in any detail (spoilers, as Greg called them). And then there was Greg’s personal life — beyond the obvious, that Mycroft could observe; it was not his place to pry.
Greg wore a gold band. One of two gold bands. Mycroft had mostly seen him with the newer one. Not more than three years old, even when Greg was at the oldest Mycroft had met him.
Mycroft tried not to stare — it made his cheeks warm.
*
At school, his peers had become inclined to take pride in a specific category of topics, a certain type of jokes. Girls. Sex. Mycroft did not join them. He’d surmised he was most likely gay. In concept only — none of the boys at Eton had remotely tempted his interest, nor did any other he had met, younger or older, on reflection.
Until he thought of the one time traveller in his acquaintance. He flushed, and firmly halted that train of thought.
Mycroft did not fantasise, though those involuntary whilst asleep, he could not control. And more than once in his adolescent dreams his mind had taken the liberty to envisage what it would be like to be a man — a man, not a boy. Someone that Greg would regard as his peer. Someone that could..love Greg, in the adult sense of the word, and was worthy of having that love be returned.
He had awoken flustered. Uncomfortable, and ashamed.
*
That warm August day, his A Level results in hand, Mycroft took the train to London, in search of Greg. Somehow having faith that Greg would be there. Greg was always there on days that mattered the most.
Greg had been waiting for him at their bench in St James’s Park. He wore a crisp dinner jacket that accentuated his physique, his attire complete with an emerald green tie and a matching pocket square.
Mycroft found it terribly distracting.
Greg beamed as he saw Mycroft, striding over to pull Mycroft into a hug, before firmly gripping Mycroft’s shoulder as he offered his congratulations.
As Greg naturally enquired about Mycroft’s plans for the ensuing two months, before the start of his university term, Mycroft regretted being unable to recover his full focus, his joy from earlier that morning forgotten, short-lived.
The scent of wine on Greg. And a hint of the cologne Greg rarely wore. The lack of a ring — Mycroft had only seen Greg without one on two previous occasions.
He should be happy for Greg. He was happy for Greg, sincerely.
Yet there was perhaps just a tinge of something unsettling weighing on his lungs, unfamiliar, and unpleasant. Something he refused to identify.
“I am sorry that this is interrupting your date, Greg. I do hope you will have a nice evening when you return.” He said carefully.
“Oh. Uh,” Greg blinked at him, surprised, amused, “It wasn—” he started to say, before seeming to reconsider. “Thank you. I..think we will.”
There was a slight smile tugging at the corner of Greg’s mouth.
Mycroft tore his eyes away.
*
Years passed. Mycroft stood taller than Greg now, Greg who no longer ruffled Mycroft's hair.
He’d graduated from university — Balliol College, Oxford3 — top of his year for the Philosophy, Politics, and Economics course, and accepted an offer to a job of which he was not to speak outside of his employment.
The day of his degree ceremony, Greg, who looked so pleased, so proud, gave him a framed copy of If, the poem that Mycroft had long knew by heart.
…If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings—nor lose the common touch;
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run—
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!
In his 21st year, for the first time in his life, Mycroft thought that the notional gentleman that Kipling had described, the man that Greg believed Mycroft had potential to be, did not seem so distant an image after all.
The same year, as it turned out, would also mark an end to Mycroft’s sporadic crossing of paths with the time traveller, as Mycroft would realise, much later. He was concerned that Greg might have been unwell, and took some comfort reminding himself of the number of plausible reasons for the alternative, that Greg was simply disinclined to see him again.
Greg had admitted to having no conscious control over the time and place he was to be briefly transported into, yet what about subconsciously?
Mycroft had been independent even as a child, and was more than capable of being his own guide, his own judge as well as solace, as he made his way through his adult life and career, finally a man. And Greg, who was kind, so wonderfully, incredibly kind, decided it best that he gave his time and wisdom to those truly in need.
And, what was more, Mycroft feared, his time with Greg had ended because, in those few final meetings, Mycroft had let his unrequited affection become embarrassingly transparent to Greg. Greg, who was married, and only ever cared for Mycroft like he would a child.
In his 21st year, Mycroft finally moved to London, to find that Greg, had moved on.
But really, as should Mycroft. Greg had a life in his own time.