#2: To Escapism and Instant Coffee

(A/N: Title is from a Hunter S. Thompson quote if I remember correctly)


9th June 1756
                  
I miss coffee.

It sounds stupid, really, but here I am, tied up in a dark, dingy cellar with my best friend and the only person in the whole space-time continuum who could save me all the way over in another century. I've been here a week now, by my reckoning - and I was always good with time – and yes I've been fed and watered, but the one thing I really, really miss, is sitting in a nice cafe with Lucius (the aforementioned best friend) drinking a cup of coffee and fighting over who gets the last bit of the lemon drizzle cake.

There's this place in twenty-first century Bath that serves the best lemon drizzle cake.

I miss it. Once I'm out of here, I'll go, even if Lucius is a hundred years behind me.

I miss him, the arrogant git.

He's a time-traveller, as you may have guessed. He works for the Crown, chasing murderers and other unsavoury sorts through time. He's in seventeenth century France right now, tracking down a man called Edgar Mordecai.

Mordecai's a  mad bastard. I mean, seriously batshit-crazy.

He's a necromancer though, and they’re all a bit insane. And it explains why he has me in the dark and dingy cellar of one of those big Gothic castles. The old villainous flair for the dramatic, you know. So yes, last week I was kidnapped by Mad Mordecai and trapped in his cellar, while my best friend and general bane of my existence Lucius Rush gallivanted around France.

France, of all places. If people were countries, Lucius would be France. I mean, Lucius is a pure-breed Londoner, but he's always stylish and loves his wine and art and opera and he especially loves dramatic lazing about. He has the panache for it, you see. But he needs someone with fast reflexes and a bit of common sense, and that's me. I'm the Watson to his Holmes, if you like.

Only now I'm here, trapped, and Good God this is annoying.

You know what else I miss?

Being able to say, “I know, I'll go and see Shakespeare at The Globe.”

Or whatever else tickles your fancy.

I miss that freedom.

I miss coffee more, but that's not what you’re meant to say, is it? No poet ever wrote, “I'm trapped and alone and I wish I had my freedom back but I'd sell my soul for a cup o' joe.”

I shouldn’t say that, not really.

You never know who’s listening.

16th June 1756

Alright.

I should tell you, I'm not some weak woman. Woman, yes. Weak, no. And I wouldn't usually tell you this kind of thing, but I'm bored.

Did I tell you my name?  It’s Meg. Meg Chrona.

I've been Lucius's 'assistant' for the better part of six years, now. My dad was an assassin. He taught me the tricks. So I'm five-foot-nothing of flaming-haired badassery, with nothing to do, and it's boring.

People underestimate me. They see six-foot-two, gun-and-sword-and-top-hat-toting Lucius Rush and their eyes just skip over me.

They don't know I learned sword-fighting in Toledo, or that I can draw, aim, and fire in less than a second. They don't see the custom-made katana hidden in my skirt and the lock-picking set disguised as hatpins. Or the guns lashed to my thighs. Or the knife in each boot. Or the six years spent learning martial arts in the dojos of Japan.

I like it that way, to be honest. If they just think I'm Lucius's...oh, I don't know. Assistant? Bit on the side? Anyway, if they think I'm harmless, it makes it so much sweeter when I'm the one beating them six ways to Sunday.

It's annoying, though, when they don't underestimate you and stab you in the neck with a syringe full of sedative and lock you in a cellar.

Very annoying.

I don't mind too much, though. I mean, this is the fifth time I've been kidnapped in as many years. It's all getting a bit old-hat, to be frank. In another week or two Lucius will come crashing through the reinforced steel doors and yell “Miss me, my dear?”

I'll say “You're late,” he'll say “Better than being early,” and try to check me for injuries while pretending to be totally disinterested, and off we go to the nearest Starbucks. Other purveyors of bad coffee are available.

He's a complete git.

Still miss him, though.

I miss coffee more.

23rd June 1756

Three weeks.

Getting a bit ridiculous now.
Have you forgotten me, Lou?

How'd that song go? Lou, Lou, skip to my Lou, my daaaaaaarling. Is that it? Can't remember. I do that, sometimes. Torture him with anachronisms. He really hates it when I sing ABBA songs in Victorian hansoms. Well, he hates it when I sing ABBA songs regardless of when we are. He hates it more when I get him addicted to custard creams or cookie dough ice-cream and then make him go somewhere they don't have it. Like 1410. They don't have anything good in 1410.

We met in 1834. He was holding interviews at the Aion Club for an assistant. I should say I met him in 1834 at the Aion Club. I don't know when he first met me.

Lou, Lou, skip to my Lou, my daaaaaarling.

Oh, come on, where are you?

When are you?

I bet he's forgotten me and he's just lazing about in Paris, drinking coffee.

Git.

30th June 1756

I'm sick of this now.

sicksicksicksickboredboredBORED

My wrists hurt.

My feet hurt.

My back hurts.

Mordecai keeps coming in and laughing at me.

It's been ages since I had a mocha.

3rd July 1756

“Miss me, my dear?” the old git says, pushing the door open – dramatically, of course – and strolling in in his bloody long coat and his bloody big hat and his bloody stupid face.
“You're late.”
“Better than being early,” he says as he de-manacles me.
I grin at him as he puts his arm around me to hold me up, as he not-so-discreetly checks for bruised or broken ribs.  I’m wobbly on my feet and I can see him watching in his peripheral vision. I think he thinks I’ve got a twisted ankle. I haven’t, and I tell him so.
He shrugs a one-armed shrug. “Good,” he says, in his most detached tone. He helps me out into the corridor, where three guards lie in pools of their own blood. My skirt drags in it and I make a face. Lucius glances down.
“I’ll pay for the dry-cleaning,” he says.
“Yes, you will.”
He laughs, very softly. Then: “Where to?”
“Bath. 2009.”
He nods, and takes out his pocket watch. He turns it to the right year, and then we close our eyes.

4th July 2009

I tap my fingers against the mug as I stare at Lucius.
He stares back.
First one to look away gets the last bite of the lemon drizzle cake, which is almost as good as I remember.
I sip my cappuccino without breaking eye-contact

Turns out I missed him more.