Well, hello and welcome to the sequel of the brainmeltdown thing. Don't worry, Truce will be updated as usual. I would like to thank Aimofdestiny, my lovely real life friend and arting buddy for the beta of this.

"You have no idea how much this hurts, Claudia." Myka sobbed while looking into the mirror in her room. The redhead sat on the older agent's bed, carefully watching her, indecisive if she should walk over to hug her or give her the space she needed. All she could do was sit on her friend's blanket and watch her, while Myka absentmindedly stroked her flat stomach, following her hand with her eyes by staring in the cold glass of the mirror.

"I was married to her, our daughter played between the aisles of the Warehouse, the feet of our unborn son kicking in the swell of my belly. I saw her taking care of Warehouse tasks while managing our family, looking at me with love and desire. I saw her surrounded by her friends, laughing with Pete and Steve or consulting you." A delighted smile formed on the brunette's face. "And now that I look at her, it's not the same. She's not happy and neither am I. She looks at me with the same desire and love, with the same interest and I can see in her eyes that she still wants to take care of me. But I can't talk to her about this. I can't reach her." Tears formed in Myka's eyes. "I can't tell her about anything that will happen. And all we do when we sit at those tables and drink our beverages, Helena: tea, and me: coffee, is talk about anything and everything while our hearts remain silent."

Claudia lowered her gaze to the ground when the older agent turned around. "I can't bear this silence anymore, Claudia. I want to yell at her. I want to yell at her and shake her and tell her to leave her home to be with me. But all I do is look into my mug and smile about those stories she tells me about Adelaide. All I can do is watch her eyes glow when she speaks about that girl. All I can do is stay and wait, while it eats me up inside."

Helena poured herself another cup of tea from her pot and took a small sip. She was sitting on opposite Myka in the only coffee shop in Univille. Her long black hair was restrained into a strict pony tail and she wore a grey wool jumper that the younger woman more than disliked on her. This in front of her was so not H.G. Wells, Warehouse 12 agent, famous 'father' of science fiction, the strong but broken woman who attempted to bring another ice age to the world. No, this was Emily Lake, who lived in the suburbs of Boone, Wisconsin and who worked at a small forensic laboratory when she wasn't at home taking care of her boyfriend and his daughter.

Myka stirred her coffee and watched the three bubbles on the black liquid swirl. This was their fifth meeting since Helena had called her on her mobile phone when the Warehouse agent had been in the diner in Texas.

Three months had passed since Myka's heart had pounded in her chest while she had nervously answered the phone call. Three months since Helena's thick British accent in Myka's ear had caused this warm feeling in her stomach. And now they sat here again. Again they shared silence, neither of them sure if this was awkward or comfortable. Myka didn't know Helena enjoyed being silent with the younger woman. It gave her a feeling of being safe, a little glimpse of a world she used to be part of and she desired to experience again, something she would never admit out loud.

On the other side, the nervous secret service agent, who had had an accident with an artifact eight months ago and travelled to their mutual future, where they were married and had a child. With every day that had passed since that accident, Myka had grown less certain if what she had seen had been real. Had it been just a dream? Had she really seen her daughter from a more distant future trying to save her life? Had she really watched the same girl, much younger then, lying on her bed in their home and drowsily asking her mothers to read her a story? Hadn't it just been a dream when she had pressed her lips onto her Helena's in those few seconds when she'd thought the time lines in which she could do that would be erased along with her memory?

And still... she could remember those lips pressed against her own, she could remember the taste of Helena's tongue and the warmth of her arms being wrapped around her. And there was the scar on her right shoulder which Myka still couldn't quite explain, even to herself. When her daughter had visited her time line, an older version of the Myka herself inhabiting the girl's body had gotten shot. After the disaster in the future had been prevented, the time lines had collapsed and everything that had happened was undone, which also meant the shooting and therefore the wound on Myka's shoulder. But the scar from the shooting wound was still there, even though the event that caused it had never happened.

That inexplicable scar was the only reminder of what had happened, the only thing she could hold onto that kept Myka alive between her doubt and insecurities about Helena's feelings.

And now they shared silence, awkward or not; it gnawed at Myka from the inside. She couldn't bear hearing Helena talk about the life she shared with her boyfriend Nate and his daughter in the suburbs of Boone. Helena likewise couldn't bear the agent's talk about the Warehouse - and since those were the only topics in their lives they both couldn't help but remain silent. The watch on the writer's wrist ticked rhythmically and Myka's spoon rattled against the porcelain of her mug.

"So." The brunette said and Helena looked up from her cup and smiled at her. "How's Adelaide?" Adelaide was the only topic they actually talked about. The girl was lucky to have Helena around and the writer was delighted by the girl.

"Oh, she's started taking violin classes, now. She asked to learn an instrument and she, Nate and I decided that violin is the one that we all like best. Now, a few weeks later I started regretting this decision because in unskilled hands, this instrument sounds horrifying." H.G. chuckled and rolled her eyes a bit, while Myka tried to fight against the feeling of a blade cutting through her chest.

The agent swallowed hard and looked up from her mug for a short moment just to drop her gaze towards the black liquid again.

"So, you're... you're hap-" Suddenly the younger woman's Farnsworth buzzed. Myka was sure she had never been happier about a buzz from this device in her life.

Claudia Donovan stared silently at her computer screen. She had written a program designed to initialise a scan of all the electric devices in the Warehouse. Now she was about to test it for the first time. While watching the program's progress bar move ever-so-slowly, the redhead slouched into her chair and carelessly flung her feet on the table. She was alone in the Warehouse, except for Trailer lying under the table and causing rhythmic snoring noises. Abigail was in the B&B, trying to go through some bills. The future caretaker of the Warehouse just hoped the keeper of the inn wouldn't recognize that she, Claudia, was responsible for the very high total on the water bill last month. She had taken a few more showers, that was true. Pete and Jinks were on a mission. Claudia would have gone with Jinks instead of Pete but she had promised Artie to complete the program before the old man came back from his date with Vanessa. It was their first one since their break up, when Artie had thought someone else was after the attractive doctor.

And Myka... well, Myka had her thing with H.G. The two of them met occasionally for coffee. The young Warehouse agent was sure it was at least unhealthy for Myka, now that she had travelled through time to see herself married to the beautiful Brit. They were obviously in love, but neither of them had the guts to talk about it.

So Claudia had stayed in the Warehouse all morning, paying attention to one computer to see if there was any ping, watching her Farnsworth in case that Pete or Jinks had one of their usual accidents on the artifact hunt and needed her to rescue their asses, and working on her scanning program. If this program worked, they would never have to do a manual check up on the Warehouse's hardware again. Instead it would just be a press of a button.

As the progress bar completed and the program asked for input, Claudia congratulated herself for being the smartass she was, leaned forwards, and typed 'RUN' into the console. An electrical hum went through Artie's office and then through the whole Warehouse. Claudia was proud; her program was actually working. Well, of course it was working, after all, she had programmed it.

Clusters of numbers and words ran over the screen of her computer, logs were formed, data was collected and after a few seconds, the electrical hum increased and Claudia frowned, a little confused. Then, a flash of lightning from the Warehouse brightened her face. That was not supposed to happen. There shouldn't be any lightning at all - and this hum was already far too loud for the taste of the redhead's ears. Then, to make matters worse, one of the fuses on the wall behind her exploded with a loud bang and a shower of sparks and the girl started panicking in earnest.

"No!", she yelled, scrambling to get out of her chair. Trailer had already stood up and was now barking at the fuses, which one after another exploded, each bang louder than the last, in a veritable cascade of sparks.

"No! No! No!" Claudia jumped up and down in front of those fuses, hoping her yelling would stop them. Instead there was one last zap and the whole Warehouse went black, including all computers and the red light of the microwave's time display in the small kitchen.

"FRAK!" The redhead yelled. Artie was gonna kill her. Grumps was definitely going to kill her. Claudia cursed herself. She had hacked into the servers of NSA, FBI and CIA and other agencies with three-lette names and now she was unable to produce a simple program? All it was meant to do was scan the Warehouse's electric devices! This was the point where she declared herself a big disappointment. Then she slowly made her way through Artie's office, with groping hands, because she couldn't see a thing in this darkness. After two steps, she tripped over Trailer, who whimpered indignant.

"Shush you!" She yelled at him. "Don't stand in my way while I am trying to solve this situation."

A few more steps in the dark and some painful contact with a shelf later, Claudia finally found the cupboard where they kept the emergency flash lights. She pulled one out and turned it on. The first thing she saw was Trailer's face. She could have sworn the dog was laughing at her.

With the flashlight's help, Claudia managed to make her way over to the desk again. The first thing she tried to do was to turning the computers back on again, just in case, of course without any success. Then she walked over to the wall of fuses and tapped her fingers against one of those fuses by the dim light her flashlight provided, which of course had absolutely no effect whatsoever on the current state of electricity loss in the Warehouse.

Have you tried turning it off and on again? Claudia asked herself and pulled the big lever next to those fuses. In reaction, nothing happened.

"FRAK! FRAK FRAK!" Claudia ranted into the darkness and pulled that lever a few times more with dying hope that it would actually help.

Okay, concentration. She just had to replace all those fuses and find the error in the system and check if all the wires in the Warehouse were still intact and all of that until tomorrow evening because by then Artie would be back.

Suddenly, her Farnsworth buzzed and Claudia rolled her eyes. Of course. She walked over to her desk, opened the communication device and yelped when she saw Artie's face on the screen. Quickly she held the flashlight under her face so he could see her.

"Claudia! Is everything alright at the Warehouse?" The senior agent asked and the redhead nodded in reaction. "I have a strange feeling." He mumbled more to himself than to her. "A very strange feeling."

"Of course everything is alright. What should have gone wrong? My experiment with the scanning program? Of course not, Artie, it's running like Usain Bolt." The girl replied and tried to hide the nervous quiver in her voice.

"Why are you sitting in the dark?"

"Uhm... I am... I am in the dark vault, checking something. My perfect little program has scanned that the door opening device has in fact a malfunction and I had to check on it." Claudia lied. She was proud of how easily that came over her lips.

Artie's view rested a few seconds on her. "Then make sure that the Gooery is alright, too. Its electric system is connected to the dark vault's so they can work on in a case of a electricity loss."

Claudia's eyes widened. The Gooery. Frak. She hoped it wouldn't attempt to explode like the last time.

"Yeah, Artie. Of course this was the next step on my list. I hope Vanessa is enjoying her date with you?" Now the redhead tried to lead attention Artie's attention away from the Warehouse.

"Well, I didn't ask her, but the last time I've checked she looked quite happy." The older agent answered and frowned a little. "Maybe I should ask her. Do you think I should ask her?"

"No, I don't think so, love bear. But do you know what I am thinking? I am thinking you should go back to your date and spend more time with her than with me on the Farnsworth to make sure she's enjoying it." Claudia demanded.

"Are you trying to teach me-"

"Artie, go back to your date. Everything is under control." With these words, Claudia closed the Farnsworth and sighed. Trailer had placed his head on her knee and showed her his puppy eyes. "Oh Tray, I have no idea how to manage this. I can't ask Abigail for help, I'm sure she is already mad at me, Pete and Jinks are on a mission and the last person I would ask is..." She sighed again. "You know what? I will just ask Myka. Her super brain could actually help me thinking. She can't differentiate a fuse from a remote control, but I'm sure her pretty brain can do this eidetic thing with the electronic schematics so I won't have to carry them around with me. Is that a good idea, Tray? It is." Stroking the dog's head, Claudia opened her Farnsworth again, swapped to Myka's channel and called her. The brunette's face appeared on the screen faster than Claudia had expected it.

"Claud? Is anything wrong? Is it Pete? Has he had another accident with an artifact?" Myka asked, far more excited than she was supposed to be, since she had time off.

"Ehm, no Mykes. There is another problem... I did a thing." The redhead allowed her view to wander through the dark office and then to the Warehouse aisles. "Or maybe two or three. And I could use your help."

The older agent frowned. "What is it?" She asked.

"I may or may not have ruined the whole Warehouse's electricity system?" Claudia shrugged. "And now I may or may not be sitting in complete darkness, with only two hours' time until the Gooery explodes. And the worst part is that I suspect Artie has an idea of what I just did and will be breathing down my neck until tomorrow evening."

Suddenly H.G.'s face appeared next to Myka's. The Warehouse agent looked a little distracted at the Brit and backed slightly up from her. The writer seemed completely oblivious to Myka's struggle with her.

"You did what, Claudia?" The Victorian asked with widened eyes. "Repairing the Warehouse's whole electricity system on your own would take at least two weeks. You have to scan for cable breakage, the old hardware has to be checked..."

"H.G. thank goodness you are around." Claudia blurted out in excitement. "You were an inventor back in the day and at least 70 percent of the Warehouse's hardware is as old as you!" The writer frowned at the girl. "So could you please forget your try to be super suburban mom of the year and instead be yourself and maybe come over and help me? I mean, us two, with Myka's eidetic memory? We could totally do this whole thing in five minutes or maybe please before Artie comes back...? Please H.G." Claudia pleaded and watched Helena chew on her bottom lip. "Please."