Chapter Text
It was 1929 in Chicago and about to rain and Vertin tried, she really did try.
In the few minutes left as the Storm began to brew, she had her suitcase open on the floor, her incantations ready, and her mind running over every step of the experiment that she had refined time and time again before succeeding with Regulus in London during the '60s.
"My lord, it's going to be alright," Schneider said nearby as the other arcanists one by one reverted to their animal forms and piled into the suitcase: Druvis daintily padded inside as a black cat sprouting choker and hat, while Sotheby barreled in as a white ram with angel wings and a pearl necklace and X followed her inside as an albino mouse with a lanyard with APPLe close behind as the levitating fruit he was and always would be.
"Get in."
"You can't save me."
Vertin doesn't look at her. She's looking at her watch. She wished she had more time to revise the experiment. It didn't seem fair that she never knew she'd need to modify it for humans. She's still thinking about that time in the fields of that burnt out husk of a forest with the raining down on her and Schneider kneeling by her with the umbrella. She's kneeling next to her right then. "I have to try," Vertin said and this time she looked at Schneider. "Now get in."
The other girl was on the verge of tears, but she still had the energy to smirk. "If that is what my lord commands," she teased. "But please, don't be so harsh on yourself at the end of it all."
Then before Vertin on the floor was a golden insect with gossamer wings, so small, so fragile, that her hands shook at the thought of touching it lest she hurt Schneider.
"Let me help," Sonetto said sharply as she held out both her own steady hands for the golden insect to jump in. "Focus on what you need to do."
"I can't, there's not enough time." Vertin thought of that night when she watched her classmates open the door and run out into the Storm and gesture for her to join them as they turned to glass and then broke like all the pieces of a shattered kaleidoscope.
Apparently, Sonneto was thinking the same thing. "You're the Timekeeper, and you have all the time in the world," she said more softly, and while Vertin would realize later on that while it was not what she wanted to hear, it was what she needed to hear right then and there.
So Vertin cast her mind away from all the what-ifs and should-nots and resumed the incantations while Sonetto helped Schneider into the briefcase before following after the insect inside as a graceful red fox. Outside the skies roared and the day turned to dark and even as Vertin glanced outside one of the many windows from the dining room in Sotheby's estate, she was sure she could see the first droplets of moisture rising before the Storm struck the building with full force.
“I think I like girls,” Vertin said from her bed one day, her mind in a tangle of thoughts as she watched the rain gently patter against the window.
Lilya paused in the middle of uncapping her canteen, hesitated, and then quickly resumed unscrewing the cap before throwing her head back and taking a huge swig.
As it turned out, waking up from a two month coma was not without its own complications. It took a week before Vertin learnt how to walk again, and the doctors said it would be a month before she can move unassisted.
In that time, the other arcanists took turns watching Vertin like birds of prey looking after a nestling that had already come close to falling out of the tree. She did not return to the hospital – after what happened she dared not – and Madam Z had the Timekeeper’s own quarters modified into a makeshift clinic. An IV pole was positioned next to Vertin’s bed though she had no need for it for days now, and an intercom system had been installed in case a doctor needed to be reached.
Sitting on a stool by the Timekeeper’s bedside, Lilya waited for the burning sensation of liquor rolling down her throat to subside as she gathered her thoughts. She recalled how she crashed through Vertin’s hospital window and abducted her, and remembered that for all her poise and the way the Foundation lauded her, the Timekeeper was still young and very easily impressionable. That same stunt was also the reason why she was currently suspended from her duties and grounded from flying her beloved SU-01ве. “Are you hitting on me?” She asked.
Vertin’s eyes widened. “No, of course not,” she protested.
Lilya let out a breath. “Ok good, because watching Sonetto making eyes at you was nauseating enough, without me having to explain to her that I-“
“Sonetto does what?” The Timekeeper asked sharply.
Lilya froze. “Nothing,” she said quickly.
“You said she makes eyes at me.”
“Yes, she’s always eyeing you. She worries about you a lot.”
“That’s not what you meant.”
“Course it is. I have a thick accent.”
An edge of disapproval entered Vertin’s tone. “Lilya,” she said warningly. “I am not that easy to fool. How long has this been happening?”
Lilya muttered something unflattering in Russian as she studied the IV pole and adjusted the earflaps of her aviator hat.
“How long?” Vertin demanded.
“Couldn’t say. It's not like I was around your school all the time.”
Vertin’s face took on a pained expression. There were years of history for her to untangle, but after what had happened to her other classmates during her first exposure to the Storm, she and Sonetto had always remained friendly, but had never been quite that close that they passed the boundary into friends. Vertin was the troubled one, and Sonetto was the teacher's pet, and at that age children formed their own cliques, and so they'd been as compatible as oil and water. In many ways, Vertin assumed that her being around Sonetto would get her into trouble, and had kept her at a distance. While Sonetto had came close to check on her but always kept her at arm’s length as if afraid of catching something.
But maybe what she’d done instead was rebuff Sonetto’s advances.
Then there was Schneider. Her loss was still raw. Vertin’s had many dreams since going under. A few of them were with her. Some of them were with her. She hoped the Foundation’s instruments, for all their sophistication and the technology with the artificial somnambulism, had not recorded them and the things they’d said to each other. The things they did together.
For a while since awaking, Vertin hadn’t been sure who she should approach for assistance with this newfound knowledge. Madam Z seemed like the most logical option, but even with her helping the bill get passed, there were still some things Vertin wanted to keep close to her chest.
Druvis was another choice, but Vertin had only known her for a short while. The same could be said about Regulus, never mind the fact that the pirate probably had a different past-time in mind if she wanted to rock someone’s world.
She definitely, definitely, had no intention of telling Constantine about this.
That’s why she blurted it all out to Lilya, who she’d known for a long time and who had taken a risk in rescuing her when she had the choice of staying out of the whole matter. “It can’t be," Vertin said finally. "I would have known.”
Lilya shrugged. “I could be wrong.”
“You’re not wiggling your way out of this one.” Vertin frowned. “I guess I’m more worried as to why she has never said anything for all these years.”
“I wouldn’t know.”
“Have you ever liked someone?”
The aviator scratched her chin. “Not really,” she admitted.
“How about that girl you helped hunt down those old radio parts? The one from the Stasi?”
Lilya grimaced and shook her head. “Bkorn? Hardly.”
Vertin smiled. “In any case, even if Sonetto liked me before, I think she’s probably gotten tired of waiting and moved on a long time ago.”
“Well I heard she was the one who insisted on being assigned as your partner once you became the Timekeeper.”
“Where did you hear that?”
Lilya cocked. “People talk. But I know with her grades she could have gone anywhere she wanted.”
Vertin dropped back on her pillows and covered her eyes with one arm. “I see,” she muttered. “So she picked me.” When she opened her eyes, Lilya was holding out her canteen to the Timekeeper and looking away.
"Don't give me that look," Lilya said sulkily. "Just don't tell Sonetto I said anything," she added as Vertin accepted the girl's awkward attempt at a bribe.
Vertin couldn’t help but get the last word in on the Russian ace pilot. “Only if you introduce Bkorn to me one day,” she teased. Then she laughed at the flush on Lilya’s face and lifted the canteen up as the other girl tried to snatch it back.