~ Chapter Eight ~
----------
~ June 27, 2017 ~
----------
Henry
Henry pulled her hair back into a ponytail, wrapping it in a rubber band she'd found in the deep recesses of her desk drawer back at her office. It was one of the only things that she brought with her when she'd come down to the research center today.
Suzannah would flip out if she saw her doing this, would lecture her on the damage she was about to do to her hair. That girl always seemed to have one or two hair ties wound around her wrist at any given moment. Unfortunately, all Henry had around hers was this rubber band.
Sighing, she glanced over at Barry, who was inputting their new figures into the program for the time and matter manipulator.
It had taken a dozen of Dr. Slone's interns and some help from a licensed piece of warehouse equipment to get this apparatus set up at the research facility on time to make sure they didn't leave Suzannah stranded in the past.
Henry knew it wasn't just the lack of sleep that was making her side eye how quickly Dr. Slone had okayed everything. Especially given his knowledge on the topic.
If Suzannah was in any danger at all because of that man's agenda, Henry was going to raise hell. At this point, she'd have rather that he secretly sent Suzannah back in time to save his prize vase on some eccentric whim, rather than being mixed up with whatever else she was beginning to suspect was going on.
As luck would have it, Phillip was crossing the lab at that precise moment, walking over towards her. She stood from stool she'd been perched upon to meet him halfway.
"Everything's pretty much set up," he said, double-checking the tablet in his hand.
"So...I have a question." Henry crossed her arms over her middle. "You were here in '87, right?"
"Here?" He pointed down to the floor.
"Correct. Here at the facility. With Ivey."
His gaze dropped down to the tablet. "He wasn't here all the time. The center's always been my baby."
"You pretended to know nothing. You let me worry about Suzannah, about the supposedly error in our calculations, when you knew all along that something else was at play. Because it had already happened this way."
"I couldn't tell you, Henry. It had to happen this way. Precisely because it already happened this way: when I met Suzannah in 1987, she was operating under the impression that she's been sent back to the wrong point in error, for longer than calculated. Which meant we had to send her to the wrong point in time for the wrong length of time. The timelines are fixed points. Nothing you did could have changed what was going to happen. The future of mankind depends upon this loop completing its cycle."
"Yes..." she said impatiently. "I know all of that already. What I don't know is why you allowed us to continue thinking we'd made a horrible mistake yesterday."
"You know this super virus will wipe out our very existence if allowed to run rampant as it has been. You've seen the figures that prove my hypothesis. I couldn't tell you I knew that this was the only chance Suzannah would have of going back in time successfully,couldn't tell you anything else because she didn't know how, exactly she was going to save us, ergo she couldn't be told. It had to happen as it had already happened. I couldn't leave anything up to chance. I couldn't have you working some miracle to get her back sooner, Dr. Laster."
"Suzannah is going to bring someone with her who can provide us with what's needed, isn't she?" Henry asked slowly, realizing what was going to happen. "Suzannah's bringing someone through the portal with her."
Phillip nodded. "Matthew Ivey. My old partner. He left with her through the portal in 1987, and took the cure for this virus in his veins with him."
"How... how can you be sure this is the cure?"
"It's complicated to explain, given how the loop unfolds," Phillip admits. "Suzannah knew Matthew's prior experimentation on himself had included the virus, to which he'd developed an immunity, because I'd informed her as such. And I knew to look into Matthew's research from before he'd disappeared because Suzannah had been sent into the past expressly for that purpose. Matthew even left a blood sample in the cryo-freeze, which supported what I knew, but he couldn't know it wouldn't work after being frozen for so long. And Ms. Jack couldn't have brought back the vials through the portal with so little testing."
"So you used Suzannah as bait to get this guy to come through the portal," Henry deduced, and none too happily, mind you. She wasn't thrilled her best friend had been used like some kind of a carrot on a stick to convince someone to follow her through the portal.
"Not at all, Dr. Laster," Dr. Slone assured her. "Suzannah and Matthew were destined to find one another. It's just a lucky coincidence that he's also the key to our salvation."
Henry jumped, her hand clutching at her collar. Perhaps that fourth cup of coffee had been a little bit of overkill. She collected herself before responding. "And no one else could have convinced him to come through the portal? Not even you?"
"I couldn't have gone back to 1987, I was already there at the research center," Slone reminded her.
"Okay, then, but if she couldn't reveal why he had to come through without breaking the loop... how did Suzannah convince Matthew to--"
"Suzannah and Matthew had somewhat of a whirlwind romance during the week she stayed here."
"Ah..." Henry pressed her lips together. "Good... good for her."
----------
~ October 2, 1987/June 27, 2017 ~
----------
Suzannah
Suzannah clasped his hand as the purple portal opened in front of them. "Ready?"
"As I'll ever be." Matthew grinned and they took a step forward into the purple swirl. He'd said goodbye to Phillip before they'd made their way to the point where they expected the portal to open. Hugged him long and tight. Then Phillip Slone had turned to Suzannah and done the same.
Suzannah shivered as they stepped in to the swirling vortex. The portal itself still felt the same as it had a week ago. Like hot ants or bees. She still wasn't completely sure. It was so fucking weird, but slightly better because Matthew had held her hand as they walked. She'd instructed him not to run, but not to stop either. No matter how weird it felt, to just keep walking.
Soon enough, they stepped out onto solid ground, very obviously in the same lab from all those years - or minutes, depending on the timeline - ago. Henry and Barry and a much older Dr. Slone were there to greet them.
"Anyone got the time?" Suzannah asked dryly, looking down at her watch as the relief of her successful journey allowed her to find her humor quickly. "Because I could have sworn that was longer than seven minutes..."
Everyone laughed,except for Henry, who instead barreled forward, her arms wrapping around Suzannah's shoulders, wrenching her from Matthew's grip.
"I'm so glad you're okay, Suze..."
"Matthew?" Suzannah craned her head over her friend's. "This is Henry."
He grinned. "Hello, Dr. Laster." He pointed to himself in slight uncertainty. "I'm Matthew... Suzannah's told me a lot about you."
"Matthew," Henry stuck her hand out to shake his, but didn't let go of Suzannah.
Though she hadn't been quire ready to let go of Matthew, had wanted to help him to settle into the twenty-first century, he was soon whisked away by Dr. Slone.
Suzannah supposed she'd technically taken him away from his best bud for thirty years. She could chill and let them get reacquainted. For now. If she had to wait too long, she was marching over there to take him back.
But for now, she was with Henry. With a side of Barry, who'd stopped simply hovering and started checking her vitals and taking other readings with some miscellaneous sciency equipment she hadn't paid much attention to when he'd taken her baseline levels with before she'd traveled.
"How was it?" Barry asked, his voice barely a whisper so Henry wouldn't hear him and clock him in the back of the head.
Suzannah grinned. "Pretty cool, actually. I went to a mall and got to buy clothes that were super cheap. I saw Baby and Johnny dirty dance on the big screen. Met my soulmate. But don't think this squares us. Yeah. I remember. You guys messed everything up."
Barry at least had the good grace not to argue with her. "Yeah... Sorry about that."
"Eh. I'm not mad. It worked out pretty well for me."
He chuckled. "Yes, I suppose so. And according to Phillip, for the rest of the world, too, since you just brought back the cure to the super virus. How did you and Mr. Cure Man meet?" He jutted his chin over in Matthew's direction.
"I tazed him."
"Of course you did. Speaking of cures and the virus..."
Suzannah cringed as Barry got ready to draw some of her blood.
"I'm going to stick you on three, okay?"
She nodded, swallowing the lump in her throat as she prepared for the needle.
Matthew
Matthew glanced around the room, a little bit overwhelmed by everything that was happening. One minute, he'd been walking through a portal, ready to start a new life thirty years in the future with the woman he loved, and the next, he was the only man alive who could save the human race.
Talk about big deals.
"So... what do you need from me?" he asked, noting how everyone in the room sighed with relief.
"A blood sample," Phillip replied.
Matthew rolled up his sleeve. "Okay, so take it. And then I can go?"
There was a wave of affirmation all around him, so he made his way to the exam table, hopping up on the stainless steel surface and holding out his arm.
"I will also need to do a short physical, just to make sure the time travel didn't change anything."
"How short is short?" Matthew asked, craning his neck so he could see Suzannah across the lab with her scientists. Looked like she was getting blood drawn too.
"About thirty minutes?"
"Yeah, okay," he agreed, not taking his eyes off Suzannah. "So, how are things, Phil? You're looking... damn. Old. Sorry."
Phil chuckled. "You're looking the same as you did the last time I saw you. Unsurprisingly."
Matthew mirrored his laugh. "So. What did you do with my house?"
"I've kept it up for you, knowing of your eventual reappearance... It might be a little dusty, so I'll send a maid up there to tidy up for you. I had meant to arrange it before you returned, but I'm afraid I got caught up in other projects, despite thirty years notice..."
He nodded slowly, wincing as the needle pierced his skin. "So uh... quick question about me going missing--"
"Yes, Matthew," his friend answered. "You never met Suzannah in her present because you were destined to travel forward with her from her past. It's all very confusing I know, but suffice it to say, you disappeared for thirty years because you traveled forward in time."
"Cool... so... I didn't mess up anything?"
"On the contrary. You've fixed it."
Matthew chuckled. "Whoa. Heavy."
----------
~ June 27, 2017 ~
----------
Suzannah
Despite assurances that things wouldn't take long, Suzannah didn't get to have Matthew to herself again until later that night. Much, much later. He jogged out beside her so they could wait for a car to take them back to her apartment. As nice as Phillip's offer for them to stay in on of his guest rooms was, Suzannah kind of wanted to sleep in her own bed. And do other things in her bed.
"Hey there, gorgeous... Missed ya."
"Missed you too... Are you -- we never really discussed sleeping arrangements, did we?" Suzannah asked.
"Well, I was hoping I could crash at your place." He clucked his tongue. "Talk about rude, I know. But while my place is still around, but it'll need some... TLC before it's liveable."
He ran his hand through his hair. His hair that he was definitely going to have to get cut into some semblance of a modern hair style at some point. But that wasn't what Suzannah needed to focus on right then.
"Is that... is that okay? Me crashing with you?"
"That is more than okay," Suzannah said with a giggle. "Besides,I was kinda hoping to show you the absolutely humongous shower I have in my place. There are three sprayers."
He whistled. "Three? Wow. And here I was slumming it with one for most of my life. I do have one question though..."
"What's that?"
"I was hoping to get your thoughts on spelunking. You know, seeing as we haven't had sex in thirty years."
Suzannah rolled her eyes and laughed. "Tell that to my hickeys."
"I would, but..." he clucked his tongue once more. "I don't think they'd agree with me. And I kind of need someone to corroborate my story here."
"Well, let's see how the shower goes. Maybe you can spelunk in there a little bit."
"Sounds good to me... Seeing as we have all the time in the world now."
The tears were there again, but this time, instead of pushing them down, she let them fall. She wrapped her arms around Matthew's shoulders. "We do, don't we?"
They did have all the time in the world. They had a future.