Are you interested?

Helga needed to stop being surprised by the question Xu asked. Everyone wanted to know. Sometimes they were curious about how and why such a thing existed. But here? Here it was different.

She knew the context. It was not her first rodeo. No matter how far she separated herself in time and space, someone, somewhere, had the same intent.

"Funny story, that." Helga took another drag. "I can tell you how I got there. I can tell you what I was doing there, and what I found there. I can even tell you how I got out. But the one thing I can't do is tell you exactly where it is. Think of it like an NDA that I'm perpetually suffering under."

She couldn't even tell Seifer.

Telling her bluntly about the thing that fixed Xu is not to her purpose-- so there's a second where she's honestly not sure what she believes, and it probably registers on her face, surprised enough that she doesn't bother to hide it.

But there are probably enough details in the story surrounding it that she could get a team out, looking for the source of that power. If there's one thing Garden's very, very good at, it's working off extremely limited information.

Xu watches the crystal turning lightly on its chain, refracting tiny flashes of light off its facets from the lamplight. If it were anyone else, there would be an urge, one she wouldn't be sure she could stop, to get the gun out of her side table's drawer, shoot the person carrying the crystal, and keep it for herself.

But Helga is her friend. Helga is one of the very few people left in the world that Xu can trust.

"Thanks. There's a lot to that story, and I really don't want to go back into it. Can't have myself looking less-cool now, can I?"

She tapped the ash from her cigarette into a glass ashtray and contemplated snuffing the thing out half-through. Was it time to swing wildly from one addiction to another? Had smoking gotten old?

"So yeah, now you sort of know. The whole age thing isn't a gimmick. It's not some sort of mental psychosis. It's the truth. It's the thing that keeps me going and the reason I can't stop.

"Can't get rid of me that easily," Helga joked. She stood, then helped Seifer into the wheelchair because the nurse would not let them proceed otherwise.

Four hours of X-rays and prodding and questions, and they were finally out of the hospital. She helped Seifer into the car, then flopped into the driver's side next to him.

"Want anything particular?" She could kill for some chili fries.

"Or should we stop by the house first, fix you up, and then go? Because I can do either. And I know those things fucking itch."

Paramagic's one thing. Deep sea mystery magic is a whole other beast.

He absolutely wants a cigarette, tapping two out the pack and lighting them both with a snap of his fingers, an easily-controlled tiny flame so much more efficient than her trying to find her damn lighter.

Seifer inhales, and passes one of them back to her, shoving the pack back into the console where it belongs.

"And warning taken. I'll grab some tomorrow." Helga accepted the cigarette from Seifer, leaning in a little further to kiss his cheek. They would last long enough until they got back to the apartment, and then she had her house-pack to rely on. Car-pack could be replenished on the way to Garden.

She took a drag and exhaled before putting her window down enough to vent.

–

It took days to finalize the added provisions and accommodations for Preston Whitmore’s newest hand-picked addition of the team. Was she still a bit bothered by it? Certainly. Almost every member of the crew had been hand-picked by way of a network of extensive contacts. To have an intruder, a stranger, with nothing to him but an attitude and a weird gun, fast-tracked into everything? It rubbed her wrong.

Don’t worry too hard on it, Lyle had said one evening after cigars and brandy, sitting in her office as Helga paced the wooden floor. We work in surprise variables all the time. One man isn’t going to bring everything down. It’s just another rich man’s passion project. There’s nothing that can go wrong.

That’s not it, she had replied, sitting on her desk, hunched over with her hands on her knees. It’s the principal of it. It’s… I don’t like this. Not one bit.

And he had just smiled, walked over to her, patted her head. Tilted up her chin. It’s going to be alright. Trust me.

That was a week ago. Helga held onto those words with her as she sat in the belly of the last plane off of the Faroe Islands. Everything - everyone - had made camp in Stafafell already. Lyle had gone on the first plane. She begged to go with him. She had been told to bring up the rear.

The last equipment, the last supplies. The last man: Seifer Almasy.

How dangerous was it to fire a gun in a plane?

“First Lieutenant. United States Army,” she answered. The question was grating, if not unfounded. She was a woman. It may be the 20th century, but the Suffragettes were still fighting to let women vote. One with military credentials was not a common sight. “Lied my way into enlistment. Became too valuable to kick out… and too embarrassing to admit they’d been fooled.”

It was a point of pride. She did not hide her smirk. Helga heaved a rucksack over her shoulder, pushed her bangs from her face, and motioned for Seifer to follow.

“Our ride should be showing up shortly. Driver is Manuel Ramirez, formerly Mr. Whitmore’s personal head mechanic. His English is fine, but he’s not a big talker. That’s Vinny.” And Vinny… well, he would meet Vinny soon enough.

“We’re camping in Stafafell, and from there our geologist and cartographer will have mapped our path inward towards the dig site.

Just when he thought he’d never see any of them again, here they are, wrapped up in one coiled-spring tense blonde. She’s even got that self-assured, catlike confidence. One wrong move, and she’d rip out his throat, too.

He likes that in a woman.

(Maybe he’s just a little fucked up from seeing Trepe come strolling through the halls one time, mouth and throat caked in someone else’s blood.

But he’s always been a little fucked up.)

"Hell of a rank. You still in? Or out?” Considering how he’d met her, with a gun in his face and the general idea that she practically lived at the manor.

He gets the feeling that she doesn’t talk all that much about herself, too.

Their ride pulls up, a truck that sputters, coughs, and comes to a stop. He raises a brow, tossing his bag and Hyperion’s case in the

As if on cue, Manuel pulled up in one of the assigned Jeeps. Was it a good-looking vehicle? No. God, no. This was an outing based on a bet based on a hunch. They got what they needed, and would get nothing else until it was proven that the first expedition was worth it.

And if they didn't? There simply would not be a second one. Hopefully, at least, her pay would not get cut.

"Hola, Ramirez," Helga greeted, tossing her sack into the back of the truck with Seifer's. "How's camp settling?"

"Well enough," the driver replied with a kind smile. "Cookie made soup."

Helga pulled a face and opened the side-door of the truck. "Glad I ate before we got here.

"Almasy, you either get to sit in my lap, or back with the gear. Pick wisely." Not that she gave him time to choose; Helga closed the door as soon as she was settled.

"Ride's about an hour. Better get comfortable. Nap if you can. Things are going to be busy once we hit camp."

Nap, she said, as if the ride was not rocky and horribly treacherous. The truck chugged along, barely hindered by the hard-worn road that seemed not really a road at all. The truck was in no way heated, and as if things could not get worse, it began to snow.

Base camp was a circle of tents and equally beaten-up trucks. To one side, there was a large digger, three times the size of any truck, with a giant drill attached to the front, running on chain-linked treads. In the center was a roaring fire, around which a full score of men and woman bundled in winter wear huddled for warmth.

"Maybe I'll shove my stump right up your ass."

But he's smirking as he says it, leaned back in the chair with a pen and clipboard in hand to fill out all the requisite bullshit for the visit.

"Seriously, we gotta get you a little novelty keychain or something to keep your rock on. Then it's conveniently at hand."

He signs the bottom line with a flourish, handing it back to her to return to the desk. At least he's on her insurance now, and sticking Garden with the bill.

At least they wouldn't be paying for this. Helga had forgotten just how nice being insured could be.

She took the clipboard and walked it back to the counter and the bored intern behind it. They punched in some information into the computer, and asked her to go wait until a doctor was available.

So she did. She went back to Seiger, flopped into the stiff waiting room chair next to him, and rested her head on his shoulder.

"Yeah. It's not the worst I've ever had." But it hurts, and he's about eighty-five percent sure he's broken something.

Which would absolutely suck. For both of them.

"Bet we're gonna be stuck here for seven hours. You could probably go back to the hotel, get the damn thing, and come back before someone--"

And right on cue, a nurse arrives in forest-green scrubs, bearing a wheelchair.

"If I'm gonna be riding in that, I'd better be bleeding out," he says plainly, but the words hospital policy and going up to the third floor are thrown around.

He sits in the damn chair.

They leave four hours later, with certified ankle fracture, a walking cast on his leg and a pair of metal crutches jammed under his arms that he immediately wants to throw in the trash the second they're out of eyesight of the doctor.

"Can't get rid of me that easily," Helga joked. She stood, then helped Seifer into the wheelchair because the nurse would not let them proceed otherwise.

Four hours of X-rays and prodding and questions, and they were finally out of the hospital. She helped Seifer into the car, then flopped into the driver's side next to him.

"Want anything particular?" She could kill for some chili fries.

"Or should we stop by the house first, fix you up, and then go? Because I can do either. And I know those things fucking itch."

"Maybe I'll shove my stump right up your ass."

But he's smirking as he says it, leaned back in the chair with a pen and clipboard in hand to fill out all the requisite bullshit for the visit.

"Seriously, we gotta get you a little novelty keychain or something to keep your rock on. Then it's conveniently at hand."

He signs the bottom line with a flourish, handing it back to her to return to the desk. At least he's on her insurance now, and sticking Garden with the bill.

At least they wouldn't be paying for this. Helga had forgotten just how nice being insured could be.

She took the clipboard and walked it back to the counter and the bored intern behind it. They punched in some information into the computer, and asked her to go wait until a doctor was available.

So she did. She went back to Seiger, flopped into the stiff waiting room chair next to him, and rested her head on his shoulder.

@lieutenantxsinclair

"I think I'll survive," he replies with a roll of his eyes, leaning on her as they limp into the emergency room. At least it's Timber's ER, where no one really knows them.

She dumps him in a chair near the door, and Seifer scowls at his leg-- it hadn't even been a job. It had been a goddamned run, on some well-groomed trails through the woods, and his foot coming down on a rock he hadn't seen.

She doesn't mean it, of course. And, frankly, a busted leg is something she could heal without issue. If she had thought to bring the damned thing needed to do so. It was a run. Nothing strenuous. Nothing dangerous. Standard activity.

And all it took was a half-buried rock to mess things up.

"Maybe." Some of them, yeah. Some of them? Hell no. Those secrets were going to be between her and whatever sick, twisted Gods existed and she would never meet.

She took a deep drag and felt the familiar, delightful burn in her lungs. Time to pick this one back up again.

The way Xu touched the source of her wound was not lost on the blonde. She knew exactly what it was like.

She should be dead. Should be more scar than skin. And in the course of minutes, she was whole and unmarked as if nothing ever happened. Alive for another day, against the will of higher powers and stronger beasts.

"You'll get used to it," Helga assured dismissively. "Like a haircut. It'll be weird at first. You'll keep looking at it, thinking something's going to be there that isn't. And then one day, you'll stop."

There's never nothing.

So, she pulls her hand away, opting to pay more attention to her fresh cigarette than the wound that isn't.

"Where'd you get it?"

Not from around here, that's for damn sure. Unless they've been rooting around in little secret corners of the world, paying for it all with Helga's Garden paycheck.

Helga needed to stop being surprised by the question Xu asked. Everyone wanted to know. Sometimes they were curious about how and why such a thing existed. But here? Here it was different.

She knew the context. It was not her first rodeo. No matter how far she separated herself in time and space, someone, somewhere, had the same intent.

"Funny story, that." Helga took another drag. "I can tell you how I got there. I can tell you what I was doing there, and what I found there. I can even tell you how I got out. But the one thing I can't do is tell you exactly where it is. Think of it like an NDA that I'm perpetually suffering under."

She couldn't even tell Seifer.

"Eventually. Results may vary."

Helga tapped at her thigh, trying to resist the urge to take a cigarette for herself. She said he was going to quit. All cadets had their vices they had grown into, but she was supposed to be better than them.

But the stress gnawed at her. This was not how she wanted Xu to find out her pretty little secret. If Helga had it her way, Xu never would have found out. It would have been between her, Seifer, and a million dead men and women that got just a little too close for comfort.

But she did not want to see Xu die. She was too valuable. Too powerful. Too...

No. Stop that.

But it didn't matter what too Xu was. She was dying, and Helga had a split second to weigh her options and act.

So out came the crystal she kept on her key ring, and she pressed it against the gaping horrible wound, and prayed that she had the ability to do what had been done to her.

It worked. For better or for worse, it worked.

"I'd take the next couple of days off, at least, to make sure you've got feeling in your fingers before you go back." Fuck it. She grabbed a cigarette and lit it with a practiced flick of the lighter.

Interrogating Helga isn't something she really has the energy for right now; Xu climbs down from the windowsill, and sits down next to her, reaching for another cigarette from the pack.

Her entire place is going to smell like a damn ashtray by the time this conversation is over, she suspects. Oh, well. She'll open all the doors and windows and empty a can of aerosol deodorant into the air.

Won't be the first time. Won't be the last.

There is no more gaping horrible wound; it doesn't stop her from pressing her fingers absently against her stomach, where it had been, where the damn Wendigo had torn her open almost stem-to-stern.

Now there's nothing, not even a faint scar as proof that it had happened at all.

"Maybe." Some of them, yeah. Some of them? Hell no. Those secrets were going to be between her and whatever sick, twisted Gods existed and she would never meet.

She took a deep drag and felt the familiar, delightful burn in her lungs. Time to pick this one back up again.

The way Xu touched the source of her wound was not lost on the blonde. She knew exactly what it was like.

She should be dead. Should be more scar than skin. And in the course of minutes, she was whole and unmarked as if nothing ever happened. Alive for another day, against the will of higher powers and stronger beasts.

"You'll get used to it," Helga assured dismissively. "Like a haircut. It'll be weird at first. You'll keep looking at it, thinking something's going to be there that isn't. And then one day, you'll stop."

“It might’ve been the fifteenth. I don’t know. I was a little fucking busy.” 

1911. 

That’s not right. That can’t be. Seifer stares into the fire for a long time, and ignores everything they say at his back (if ignoring can be translated into, everything they say fades into nothingness, static, emptiness.)

He snaps his fingers, and a fire starts between them, a small flame that he bounces across his knuckles out of sheer reflex, something to do with his hands. 

1911. 

Maybe she hadn’t failed at it after all– there’s no way this could be possible, if Ultimecia hadn’t succeeded in some fashion at her grand, monstrous plan. 

If he falls into the wrong hands–

At that, Seifer’s head raises, and he whistles sharply to interrupt the conversation, the flame still in hand. 

He’s not entirely unarmed, sweetheart. He’ll burn the place down if he has to. 

“Hey. I’m not anyone’s goddamned property. Unless you can give me a good reason why I should stick around with you guys, I’ll take my weapon back, and see myself out.” 

He may not have thought much about the fire, but the keen and curious eyes of Preston Whitmore did. This changed things. A person traveling through time, and now this strange ability to conjure fire? His guest was certainly a man of many talents. And yes, Helga was correct: if he fell into the wrong hands, things could turn disastrous. The Butterfly Effect was a terrible thing. So he thought, watching the flame dance over-under Seifer’s knuckles, and he began to think of a solution.

“No man is property,” Whitmore said, slow and easy. “And I have no intention of treating you as such. So, I want to make you an offer, my boy. It’ll be a good opportunity for you to learn more about where you’ve found yourself, and maybe getting yourself back where you need to be.

“How would you like to go to Iceland?”

Helga almost choked on her tea. Iceland?! This man had not been among them for an hour, and he was already being invited on an expedition that had been years in the making? 

He’d lost it. He must have truly lost it.

“Because I’ll be honest, kiddo, we’re very much about to not be here for a bit. And if I know anything about the young people, they don’t exactly like sitting around! It’s an archaeological expedition. Nothing too fancy. But it’s a time out of the house, around people. You’re a military man, right? You’ll fit right in!”

Blue eyes looked from her employer to Seifer as Helga finished cleaning the tea from her chin. It was such a clever solution, as much as she hated it.

“I’ll have to rework the calculations for supplies and space-”

“Sounds cold,” he says, and closes his hand on the flame, extinguishing it until there’s nothing left but thin wisps of smoke climbing up through his fingers.

“Am I getting paid for the privilege, or am I under arrest?”

Because if there’s one thing anyone has learned about Seifer Almasy, it’s that he doesn’t do well with orders. Military man or no. Money, however– if Garden has taught him anything, it’s that money makes the world go round.

–

And so, somehow, a couple of weeks later, he finds himself on a prop plane, descending into the surprisingly green land, Helga still watching him like she hasn’t decided whether she wants to kill him or not, Seifer pretending he wasn’t aware of her doing just that, all the while plotting how easily he could kill her, or whether or not she’d be worth attempted murder as foreplay, and Whitmore prattling on about the scenery while neither of them paid attention to him at all.

She reminds him of Garden women, the bossiness of Quistis and the murderous lethality of Xu, and a hundred others he could name.

“You actual military, or get dug up out of some shadow organization somewhere?”

The question is finally broached as they pull their kit from the massive amount of supplies being unloaded– not that Seifer had been quite willing to let Hyperion get stashed, but it wasn’t like there’d been enough room inside the plane for all of them and a four-foot gunblade.

He re-latches the case, satisfied that his weapon hadn’t gotten jostled around and damaged, despite the rough flight. The case itself had been a surprising gift from Whitmore, hard-shell and leather, soft interior lined with enough foam that it could have come right from his time, and while it may not have been a perfect fit, a few swipes with a pocket knife had solved that problem.

Seifer wraps his fingers around the handle, and lifts it with ease, snagging the equally pristine canvas pack holding other gifts, spare clothes, toiletries, et cetera.

Spare ammunition, of course, someone taking one of his bullets and having more made.

(If he’s under arrest, it’s the nicest arrest he’s ever been under.)

“Or are you just really good with a gun?” Wouldn’t surprise him.

--

It took days to finalize the added provisions and accommodations for Preston Whitmore's newest hand-picked addition of the team. Was she still a bit bothered by it? Certainly. Almost every member of the crew had been hand-picked by way of a network of extensive contacts. To have an intruder, a stranger, with nothing to him but an attitude and a weird gun, fast-tracked into everything? It rubbed her wrong.

Don't worry too hard on it, Lyle had said one evening after cigars and brandy, sitting in her office as Helga paced the wooden floor. We work in surprise variables all the time. One man isn't going to bring everything down. It's just another rich man's passion project. There's nothing that can go wrong.

That's not it, she had replied, sitting on her desk, hunched over with her hands on her knees. It's the principal of it. It's... I don't like this. Not one bit.

And he had just smiled, walked over to her, patted her head. Tilted up her chin. It's going to be alright. Trust me.

That was a week ago. Helga held onto those words with her as she sat in the belly of the last plane off of the Faroe Islands. Everything - everyone - had made camp in Stafafell already. Lyle had gone on the first plane. She begged to go with him. She had been told to bring up the rear.

The last equipment, the last supplies. The last man: Seifer Almasy.

How dangerous was it to fire a gun in a plane?

"First Lieutenant. United States Army," she answered. The question was grating, if not unfounded. She was a woman. It may be the 20th century, but the Suffragettes were still fighting to let women vote. One with military credentials was not a common sight. "Lied my way into enlistment. Became too valuable to kick out... and too embarrassing to admit they'd been fooled."

It was a point of pride. She did not hide her smirk. Helga heaved a rucksack over her shoulder, pushed her bangs from her face, and motioned for Seifer to follow.

"Our ride should be showing up shortly. Driver is Manuel Ramirez, formerly Mr. Whitmore's personal head mechanic. His English is fine, but he's not a big talker. That's Vinny." And Vinny... well, he would meet Vinny soon enough.

"We're camping in Stafafell, and from there our geologist and cartographer will have mapped our path inward towards the dig site.