milliways_bar | (no subject)

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He isn't going to keep carrying around Baby's inert mobile forever. That'd just be morbid.

But he tried keeping it in his room upstairs, and that's worse somehow. It looks like a toy, sitting there. Like nothing that was ever really important.

So he's bringing it downstairs to try to find somewhere better to keep it. Maybe a shrine over the bar, like the memorial for Bernard and Tonks, if Bar herself wouldn't find that too painful. Or maybe in the Security office, in a storage closet there or something, so that if Baby ever -- if she ever does come back --

Right now Andrew's sitting by the fireplace, watching the fish swim in and out of the flames, with a mug of Irish coffee in his hand and a little metallic arachnoid in his lap.

Botherable.

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"Okay." He reaches out and strokes the little spider, briefly. "Just tell me what to do."

"I'll show you? It, it's in the Security office."

He puts down his mug and pulls himself to his feet.

Jonathan nods and follows towards the office.

"Any supplies we need to pick up first?"

Andrew shakes his head. "It's just a spoken spell, and tracing the sigils. Tim Hunter left it for me when he ..."

A short, unhappy sigh. "I wish he were still here."

"I know", he says softly. "He could have fixed this. But without him... we'll just have to do our best."

They've reached the office door. Andrew pushes it open and walks through, turns in to the outer office and moves past the desk.

There's a little room by itself back there, behind a storage closet for paperwork.

Jonathan steps into the little room after him, peering around.

"Never knew this was here. What's it for?"

"This," he says.

There's only one thing in the room: a low shelf protruding from the wall, and a book resting on it.

Andrew reaches for it. At the touch of his fingers, a faint tracery of light appears on the wall, forming a complex spell schematic.

Jonathan moves closer to study it, eyes widening.

"This is amazing work. But then... Tim."

"Yeah. He always did good work." Distantly.

"I used the skaterug I got from him in the battle, did I tell you? Only it got snagged on something, and ... I guess the spells were already failing by then."

He nods.

"You got good service out of it when you needed it, at least."

"Yeah."

He turns to hand Jonathan the book, open to a particular page. "That's the instructions for the spell, if you want to try it."

"Will do." He scans over the book quickly, moving to settle down in a corner. "Looks straightforward. So I guess we'll see."

He breathes out, and takes a seat in the opposite corner, and waits.

Jonathan reads dutifully.

He isn't sure what's supposed to happen, except that maybe the little mobile will start moving again.

There's one point where the spoken part pauses, and instructions for tracing the spell schematic take over, and then there's a few more spoken phrases.

Nothing happens until he's finished, whereupon a faint gray light pulses outward from the tracery, rippling across the walls and fading again.

Andrew swallows hard. "Baby?"

There's no answer.

"Baby?" Jonathan tries in turn, standing up and stretching before he heads over to Andrew's corner. "C'mon, wake up."

"Please."

Andrew reaches up to press a hand to the wall.

"It's okay. It's over. You're safe."

"And we came back, like we promised." He crouches to rest a hand on the mobile, stroking it like a pet.

Andrew lowers his head, silently.

Jonathan gives him a swift knowing look and drops the rest of the way to the floor, wrapping an arm around the taller man.

"We can wait for you, Baby. If you need more time."

"What if --"

He can barely get the words out.

"What if she's not coming back?"

"She can't be... gone", he says quietly after a moment. "Not with all the spells still working, right?"

"I don't know," he says. "I mean, she wasn't really a, a personality when Tim first made her -- she developed that over time, collecting impressions and memories and --"

His voice cracks. "What if that's gone?"

Jonathan tilts his head, eyes turning sad.

"You mean... when whatever happened, happened, like a reset?"