Timeless: Through Time - Garcy

The Lost Generation

Scrape my knees, whatever, ah
I'm gonna let them bleed
Got no turning back, Imma flirt with that

Get a little closer
Get a little closer

- Hailey Kiyoko, Cliff's Edge

"You sure this is the right place?" Lucy crinkled her nose at all of the dust, picking her way through upturned furniture. According to one of Josephine Baker's (yes, the actual Josephine Baker, Lucy and Rufus were still in utter shock) friends, Flynn was spotted heading towards this very house, but it seemed utterly abandoned.

"See any other old chateaus anywhere?" Hemingway raised an eyebrow. Lucy truly had been elated to meet Ernest Hemingway himself, but the novelty was wearing off. She didn't appreciate his attitude.

"Maybe Josephine's friend was wrong," Rufus chipped in.

"Yeah..." Lucy eyed the eerily dark corners of the room fearfully. She kept imagining Flynn stepping out of them, and was only made more anxious by the fact that since Baumgardener was killed by Karl, one of Flynn's guys, they had nobody to take up Wyatt's role aside from a drunk journalist. She and Rufus weren't even close to soldiers, and after their usefulness as a historian and a pilot ran dry they were both kept around as more of a morale booster. They were fondly known around Mason Industries as simply Lucy and Rufus, whereas Wyatt was always Wyatt Logan, or, if you were feeling fancy, Master Sergeant Wyatt Logan. He was clean-cut, professional, and his expertise in combat was pretty much the only reason they survived any Flynn encounters. Looking at Hemingway's weak arms and unsteady stance, she strongly wished that Wyatt was here instead.

"Josie's friend is a prostitute - a good one - and if I know anything about prostitutes, and believe me, I do, they never forget a face. She says they were here, they were here."

"Hmm, I didn't know that," Lucy quipped sarcastically. Rufus flicked up his eyebrows in mock interest. They looked back at Hemingway, but saw him swaying on the spot.

"What is it?"

"I'm going to be ill. Perhaps somebody could lead me outside."

Oh, hell no. She wasn't about to watch a drunk Ernest Hemingway chuck up.

"Rufus would like to do that," she nudged him forwards. He gave her a wide-eyed look.

"Did you not want to do it?" He put on a false smile.

"No, I think you can take this one."

"You're a big literary fan."

"No, Rufus - Rufus is gonna take this one."
Rufus looked so aggrieved whilst leading Hemingway outside that she snickered. Never meet your idols, indeed.

She waded further into the house, swinging her torch around aimlessly. Obviously, Flynn wasn't here; if he was, she would be staring down the barrel of his gun right now. Their rapport still wasn't restored to where it had been back at David Rittenhouse's mansion - she had hugged him, for God's sake, but after she had saved Rittenhouse's son all hell broke lose and he went icy cold. And then, he saved her from H. H. Holmes and let her go free with no conditions or consequences. Because of this, Lucy found it impossible to figure out what was going on inside his head. Or hers, for that matter, when it came to Flynn.

Lucy stepped into what must have once been a kitchen. Plates and cutlery were still set on the table, giving the illusion that someone would be back any minute to eat from them. A chill ran up Lucy's spine. This whole building was straight out of a horror movie.

The glow from her torch caught on something bright and reflective on the floor - it appeared to be a small ring. She knelt to pick it up but found it welded to the floor. A sizeable square of dust surrounding the ring was missing. Aha. Her suspicions of it being a trap door were confirmed when the ring pulled with it a great plank of wood to reveal a small, rickety wooden staircase heading downwards into inky blackness.