A/N: This will be a collaborative fic with wickedwanton once she's able to join in. It was written well before S.3, so when it is entirely AU from the end of S.2 forward and won't be canon compliant in most ways (possibly in all ways, but we'll see!). Thanks for reading; I can tell you that I have over 25,000 words written already so updates won't be quite as long in coming as they usually are.

This story will be a time travel fic where Molly Hooper ends up in the Victorian era with the modern-day Sherlock's Victorian ancestor and lookalike.

Warning for nightmare description of being trapped in a fire, if anyone needs it.

Prologue

Time is the school in which we learn,

Time is the fire in which we burn.

("Calmly We Walk Through This April Day" by Delmore Schwartz)

The dream is always of fire, the nightmare that jolts her awake at least once every few months, beginning in puberty. She tells no one about it; her father is already ill once they start, her mother walking around with lines of strain about her eyes and a tight, false smile on her lips as she reassures twelve-year-old Molly Hooper that everything is fine, just fine. When her father passes away two years later, the nightmare intensifies, happening almost every night for six months.

Fire, the scent of smoke, the despairing knowledge that she can't escape, that the fire will claim her, burn her, kill her hopes and dreams as well as her body. The sound of a man's voice calling to her in desperation. Her own feeble attempts to call back, stymied by the racking coughs that overwhelm her as the flames lick ever closer...

She awakens from this nightmare with a stifled cry on her lips and tears running down her cheeks, tears of mourning rather than pain, because any dream-pain vanishes like the smoke that chokes her breath. She is always safe and sound in her own bed, even after her father's death; and she always feels the same sense of loss and betrayal, as if she's had something stolen from her.

There are other dreams as well, but she doesn't associate the two – the recurring nightmare and the vague dreams of a man she assumes isn't real – until many, many years later.

The Man of Her Dreams? (January-June 2008)

The first time Molly Hooper meets Sherlock Holmes in the flesh she thinks he's the man of her dreams.

Literally.

She's been dreaming her entire life of a man with grey eyes and dark curls, although his other features are vague and unformed in the way of most dream men. But when she suddenly starts seeing that same face in various reflective surfaces at work – she's recently been employed by St. Bartholomew's hospital as their most junior pathologist – she begins to wonder if her dream man is actually a manifestation of some kind of psychosis.

If he is, it isn't a psychosis that interferes with her mental abilities or day-to-day life in any way; she hears no voices whispering in her mind and the visions are simply stable images of the same man's face over and over again. At first she tries to dismiss them as being brought on by loneliness or overwork or too much caffeine: loneliness due to the fact that she very few friends; overwork attributable to the extra-long hours she works because she frankly finds it hard to say no when colleagues ask her to do 'just one more thing before you leave'; and with coffee being one of her four main food groups her caffeine consumption has been off the scale lately.

In the beginning, these visions are just as vague as her dreams; grey eyes, dark, unruly curls, pale masculine features. However, as time passes and she settles into her position at St. Bart's, as everyone calls it, the visions sharpen so that she clearly sees the features that have been so elusive in her dreaming mind.

The first time it happens she thinks there is someone actually in the room with her. She is in the ladies' locker room, fixing her hair, rebraiding it during her break so as not to have it inconveniently flop into her face during an autopsy, when the man's face appears in the mirror, as if he's standing somewhere behind her. She starts and turns, only to discover that, no, she is still alone. When she returns her bewildered gaze to the mirror, only her own face looks back at her.

She shrugs that moment off, although she can't help wistfully wondering what she'd have done if she'd turned and actually found him behind her.

"Great. I'm going mental," she announces to the room at large. "And talking to myself, that's really going to help." Shaking her head, she hurries out of the locker room. She's gasping for a cuppa; obviously dehydration is affecting her vision.

She doesn't seriously consider a supernatural or spiritual or even Doctor Who explanation until the fleeting glimpses of her dream man start haunting her in places other than the hospital; on the Tube when the windows should reflect only herself and her fellow travellers; in the window of a shop when idly studying a pair of extremely high-heeled shoes she will never have the nerve to actually wear; and, most disturbing of all, in her bathroom mirror at her flat.

That particular vision or reflection or glimpse into an alternate universe (she is heavy on the 'Doctor Who' theory at this point) is startlingly clear and detailed, not simply there and gone in a flash like all the others. She finds herself staring, mesmerised, at the strange man's profile. He appears to be talking to someone, reaching up now and again with animated gestures, his entire face alive with curiosity and enjoyment as his cupid's-bow lips silently move.

His dark curls have been disciplined and sleeked back, showing off the sideburns she's never noticed before. His hands, when they flash into view, are long and aristocratic, quite as expressive as his gorgeous mouth and those eyes that seem to peer right into her soul when he turns as if to look at her...

The ringing of her mobile shatters her concentration as she clutches her towel to her chest. When she glances down automatically to where it sits on her bathroom counter and then back up to the mirror, the image is gone, replaced by her own, somewhat frustrated and confused face.

That is in November. Two months later, the man himself strolls into the Path lab with Mike Stamford in his wake, and Molly drops the stack of microscope slides she is holding as her face flushes hot and cold and her heart begins to pound in her chest. How can he be here, in the real world? Has she actually gone insane?

She manages to keep from panicking as Mike introduces her to the stranger. "Sherlock Holmes, please meet Dr. Molly Hooper, our newest staff pathologist and already one of our best." Mike sounds as proud of her as her own father might have, had he lived long enough to see his only child graduate from university, and Molly blushes as he continues: "Graduated first in her class – "

"And two years early due to her early admission into the programme, yes, thank you, Dr. Stamford," the other man cuts in, his voice a deep baritone that sends chills shooting up and down Molly's spine and raises goosebumps on her arms, in spite of the bored tones in which he speaks.

She blushes (again) and stammers and holds out her hand, managing to get enough control over her voice to ask him how he knew she'd graduated early. "Your age," he replies, still sounding bored, then makes one of his rapid-fire assessments that she will become accustomed to hearing in the future. "Single, never married, one cat, you live within two Tube stops of the hospital and regularly walk to work unless you're running late. Won't be able to assess your skill levels till I'm able to review one of your autopsies in person, but Stamford isn't given to hyperbole so I suppose you're relatively competent. Is that microscope available or do I have to wait until you've cleaned up the mess you just made?"

She feels herself flushing again, embarrassed that he has brought up her clumsiness in so pointed a fashion, but Mike simply grins and tells her not to worry, that it's just how Sherlock is. Then he helps her clean up the broken microscope slides as she tries to apologize and Sherlock simply stands to the side, looking bored and impatient while he waits for them to get out of his way, because apparently the microscope Molly had planned to use is the only one he wants now.

She steals glances at him as he works, mentally comparing the real thing (how can there be a 'real thing,' it shouldn't be possible!) with the man from her visions and dreams. Same aristocratic profile. Same dark curls that her fingers itch to run through, although longer in reality than she's been seeing them. No sideburns, but the fingers and hands are certainly the same – long and pale and elegant and she lingers on the memory of how it felt when he shook her hand. Cool to the touch, not sweaty at all, but he is so poised and self-contained she can't imagine them feeling any other way.

The main point of difference is the eyes. She puzzles over that as she excuses herself to the two men and hurries down to the morgue to pick up some files she left and now realizes she needs in order to continue with the report she's compiling. The eyes in her visions have always been the clearest things she sees – grey and piercing, intelligence practically shining from their depths.

The real man has the same piercing intelligence, but Sherlock's eyes are much harder to pin down as to colour – blue, green, a mixture of the two? – certainly not unless she is able to spend more than a few seconds gazing into them. Which, somehow, she does not foresee happening with the cold, aloof man she's just met.

When she returns to the lab Mike is gone and Sherlock is still peering into the microscope, not appearing to have moved since she left. "So, I'm back," she says, with no motive other than to let him know he's no longer alone in the room. Or so she tells herself, when really she knows it's because she secretly hopes to hear him speak again. To see if he looks up, offers any sign of recognition.

He does neither, merely grunts and adjusts the knob and hunches his shoulders a bit, all clear body language for 'stop bothering me I'm busy'. She sighs quietly and places the files next to her own work station.

After about an hour she realizes she's uncomfortably warm and shrugs out of her lab coat. She rises and stretches, goes over to hang it on the hook near the door, then decides she needs to lose the cardigan she's wearing as well. It's her favourite, the white one dotted with cherries that her mother bought for her the year before she'd moved to Australia with her new husband, when Molly had just graduated medical school. She sheds the cardigan, revealing her pink blouse beneath it with three-quarter length sleeves and decides it should be enough to keep her comfortable.

She returns to her work station, goes through her files and frowns; one is missing. Oh, right, she put it back earlier in the day, thinking she wouldn't need it, but of course she does. So she rises to her feet and heads for the filing cabinet, ridiculously aware of the fact that she'll have to pass Sherlock in order to get there...and cursing her heart for suddenly pounding in her chest as she does so.

It takes her a few minutes to locate the appropriate file, and when she turns back she squeaks in surprise and nearly falls into the open drawer; Sherlock has left his work station so silently, approached her without saying anything, and he is right there, inches away from her, staring intently at her right forearm, just above her wrist.

"You've burned yourself," he says, lifting his eyes to meet hers.

She nods and stammers out an explanation; she'd been in a rush this morning, had tried to cook breakfast for herself only to be spattered by the bacon grease badly enough to require the application of burn cream and a gauze pad. "And then of course Toby – my cat, oh, you already know that, sorry! – he ate the bacon after it fell on the floor, greedy beast!" she finishes up with a nervous laugh.

He remains silent, the expression on his face almost a frown, almost puzzled, eyebrows slanting together. His eyes hint at the steely grey she's seen so many times but they are still very, very blue. Lovely, but not quite the same. Does it matter? She can't say, certainly not when he seems to snap out of whatever spell has temporarily overcome him and turns away without saying another word.

She considers trying to strike up another conversation after he returns to his seat at the microscope, or at least asking why he'd felt the burn on her arm was worth getting up for in the first place if he wasn't going to so much as offer his sympathies, but the tight set of his shoulders and the frown tugging at his lips warn her off. So she tries to bury herself back in her own research, and eventually becomes absorbed enough to almost forget his presence at the next table.

Almost. When he rises abruptly to his feet and heads over to the row of Bunsen burners, she startles and watches him cross the room. He is graceful and moves with a lean economy she envies even as she admires it.

When he turns on the flame, however, a sudden panic washes over her, seemingly out of nowhere; she gasps and jumps to her feet, scattering files to the floor and causing him to turn and frown at her. Heart pounding madly in her chest, she fumbles out an excuse, piles the paperwork into a haphazard mound on the table and flees the room.

Literally flees; it is all she can do not to break into a run as she makes her way to the ladies' and from there into a cubicle. She slides the lock into place and sits, fully clothed, on top of the toilet seat, burying her face in her suddenly-shaking hands.

What the hell was that? she wonders as her heart finally starts to slow back to normal, as her breathing becomes less laboured and her shaking begins to ease. She has never suffered from a panic attack in her life, but she is well aware of the symptoms, and this definitely qualifies.

She waits a few minutes to make sure the symptoms aren't about to re-manifest, then leaves the cubicle, splashes some water on her face and examines her reflection. She has a moment of disconnection as she stares into her own anxious brown eyes, as if she is staring at another woman, another Molly Hooper instead of herself; the hair seems wrong, as if she's never worn it in a simple pony-tail before, as if it should be piled on top of her head in a bun. Even her name seems wrong for a split second; she's not Molly, she's Margaret...

The moment passes and she shakes her head. The reflection in the mirror is just her reflection and clearly she is more shaken by Sherlock's existence than she'd thought she was. Maybe it will be a good idea to take the rest of the afternoon as a sick day; Mike won't mind as the workload is light, and it isn't that long till the end of her shift and she really, really needs to take some time to try and figure things out.

Giving her reflection a sharp nod, she exits the ladies' and heads back to the lab.

It's empty. Sherlock is gone, the burner is no longer alight with flame, and her files have been neatly organized, all loose papers, she quickly ascertains, returned to their proper places. He is a puzzle, Sherlock Holmes, and even if she didn't have her dreams and visions to further complicate things, she knows she would be just as irresistibly drawn to him.

She puzzles over his existence all the rest of that day – after enduring Mike's gentle teasing at her reaction to first meeting him and getting permission to bugger off early – and well into the night, tossing and turning restlessly in her lonely bed. Why has fate or God or whoever sent her visions of a man she thought she could never have, then practically shoved him into her life even though it is abundantly clear to her that he has no idea who she is, and no interest in learning?

That turns out to be the crux of her dilemma throughout the next several months, as Sherlock becomes a familiar presence in her waking life and the visions gradually stop…but not the dreams. If anything, they intensify, frequently to the point where even the memory of them makes her blush. Oh, nothing terribly detailed happens even within the confines of her dreaming mind, but she certainly becomes familiar with his dream-self's lips on hers, his body pressed against hers and his arms embracing her. She feels warm and safe, wanted and loved in those dreams, feelings sadly not aroused by the real Sherlock, who is much more likely to make her feel self-conscious and stupid.

Although he is as cold and dismissive of her as he is of everyone else she sees him interacting with, she can't help noticing that she's the pathologist he seeks out most frequently to work with. It might be because she offers up the fewest objections to him, or is the most pliable, but she likes to think it's also because she shows the most interest in his lightning-fast deductions and the least revulsion to his sometimes bizarre experiments.

Time passes, Molly gradually becomes used to his abrupt and abrasive manner, and she finds herself becoming even more fascinated by the real man. Yes, he is handsome and radiates strength and energy in his tall, whip-thin frame, but it is his mind that captivates her the most. Sealing her fate, as it were. If it was simply his looks – and that marvelous, marvelous voice of his – that attracted her, that would be one thing. But to hear him speak, to listen to that brilliant mind at work...she's lost from the moment they meet even though she is certain he only sees her as a convenient pathologist, an extension of the lab rather than an actual person.

She's come around to believing the least implausible explanation for her sightings of him; that somehow, in spite of no family history of any sort of precognitive abilities, she's been granted brief glimpses into the future. She is a scientist and so unwilling to entertain any sort of truly supernatural connection between them, but she is not so rigid and narrow minded as to dismiss something outside the norm just because it doesn't fit comfortably into her world view. Yes, it is possible that other dimensions or realities exist, but without other evidence to show that either she's been pulled into an alternate world or that Sherlock has stepped into this reality from her dreams, she's content to go with the simplest explanation. Occam's Razor.

If she has somehow been gifted with what her Irish Nana would no doubt call 'The Sight,' it will also explain why Sherlock shows no recognition of her; she was the one doing all the seeing, as if viewing him through a one-way mirror. It still doesn't explain the differences between vision and reality – most notably the eye colour – but it makes the most sense of any explanation she can come up with. But his lack of knowledge of her means that she has to be the one to try and find a way to get him to look at her in a different way. During these first few months, however, she is unable to put together a coherent sentence in his presence unless she is deep in her work, speaking her autopsy findings into the microphone or defending her findings in the path lab.

Things finally change between them late in the summer, but it isn't a good change.