Chapter Text
Itamish III, 2176
“Someone is breaking time.”
Buffy jumped in surprise. With all the people around her, she hadn’t noticed anyone come up behind her. For fifteen years now, the most startling thing she’d had to deal with was just how bad the average tourist was at water-skiing. Of course, if they ever got better, they’d put her out of a job. She turned around. “Would it kill you to not do the whole sneaking thing?”
Illyria appeared to give the question some thought. “I doubt it.”
Buffy rolled her eyes. “Good to see you’ve really got a handle on humour, Blue. It’s nice to know that some things don’t change.”
Illyria nodded. “Your endless capacity for inane babble is as constant as ever.”
“Not bad,” Buffy said grudgingly. Her expression turned serious. “Anyway, what’s this about someone breaking time?”
“Someone has repeatedly been altering history. Sometimes on a very small scale – I believe they may have altered the course of a single atom – and sometimes significantly larger.”
“I haven’t noticed anything.”
“Your senses are limited.”
“I suppose I walked into that one,” Buffy muttered. It had been close to twenty years since she’d last spoken to Illyria. She hadn’t missed it. “Why are they doing it?”
“I’m uncertain,” Illyria admitted. Buffy blinked. Hearing Illyria admit that she was anything less than omniscient was rare. “I know it’s happening. At the moment, that’s about all I know.”
“You sure it isn’t some sort of subspace disturbance or something? Starfleet seems to love those.”
“That was my first thought. I have spent some time searching through Starfleet and Federation research databases. If anyone is aware of this phenomenon, there have been no official records of it.”
“Doesn’t mean that there aren’t some unofficial records,” Buffy pointed out. “Not like Command kept notes on everything they were up to during the war, for example. If someone’s up to some temporal shenanigans, might be a secret project.” There’d been plenty of those when the war with the Romulans had been at its height. She wouldn’t be surprised if Starfleet had greenlit something that might be able to go back two decades and end the war before it had begun. Some days, it seemed like everyone had lost someone during the war. There were always people who couldn’t move on from something like that.
Speaking of. Whatever Illyria might have said was interrupted by the arrival of a tall, slender man in his mid-forties. He had dark brown hair and bright blue eyes. “Enjoying the fair, Summers? Fifteen glorious years of this Federation of ours.” Although his voice was bright and cheerful and he was smiling, none of the humour reached his eyes.
“Hi, Danny,” Buffy said, trying to ignore the way that Illyria had sharpened when she’d seen the man approach. “Nice day for it, isn’t it?”
“It’s almost like the people who manage the environmental controls arranged a lovely sunny day for us,” Danny agreed. “Not that they’d do anything like that, of course.”
“Of course.”
“Well, Summers, I’ll leave you with your friend.” Danny nodded at Illyria. “Don’t forget that I booked you for a spin on the Ferris wheel later.” He pushed his way back through the crowd of people that were out celebrating the 15th anniversary of the founding of the United Federation of Planets.
“The resemblance to your sister is striking,” Illyria commented as soon as he was out of earshot.
Buffy sighed. “Yeah. Yeah, it is.”
“I had wondered why you’d decided to base yourself here. The life of a water-ski instructor doesn’t seem like it would suit you.”
Buffy shrugged. “I was a soldier for five years. Figured it was time for a change.”
“I’m sure that the presence of a distant nephew had nothing to do with it.”
“You know what, Blue? I think I preferred talking to you when you avoided sarcasm and stuck with the mindboggling condescension.”
“Is your inferior, linear mind capable of returning to the matter at hand?”
“Oh, thanks,” Buffy said darkly. “So. Someone’s breaking time. You don’t know who, you don’t know why. Tell me you at least know where.”
Illyria pointed at an angle 45 degrees from the ground.
“You’re telling me that someone’s messing with time, and they just happen to be doing it on the same planet that I’m on?”
If Illyria hadn’t considered herself above such things, Buffy suspected that she’d have rolled her eyes. “No. I feel someone altering time, and all of the alterations have come from that specific direction.”
“You got anything more concrete than ‘Second star on the right and straight on till morning’?”
“Not at the moment.”
“So basically you’ve got nothing, and you’ve decided that you want to come and dump your nothing on me.”
“For the past two years, someone has been repeatedly altering time on a grand scale. That seems like something that you should know about.”
“As much as I’m glad you decided to do some loop-keeping, I really don’t know what you expect me to do about any of this.”
“I will keep you apprised as I discover more. Should I vanish, then you should know that it’s in the pursuit of this information. It will be up to you to find out what happened to me, and to-”
“Have I ever told you how creepy it is that you use me as a kind of living will?”
“Yes.”
“Well… don’t.”
“If there was someone else I would use them instead.” Despite the harshness of the words, there was none of the Old One’s usual disdain.
That was the issue. There was no one else. Hadn’t been for a long, long time now.
“Anyway, I’m out of that sort of thing. Got my honourable discharge. I’m retired.”
“You will have to leave this world eventually. People will notice that you don’t age.”
Buffy shrugged. “Claiming an alien ancestor seems to be working out just fine.”
“An excuse will work for a time,” Illyria agreed, “but that time will come to an end. Whatever ties that bind you to this world will rot away.”
“I’d forgotten how cheerful you were.”
Illyria ignored her. Instead, she looked up at the Ferris wheel. “I have always enjoyed this ride.”
Buffy looked at her in surprise. “Really? I always thought you saw things with no practical purpose as below you.”
“One seems to move so far, and yet in reality one gets nowhere.”
Before Buffy could even try to say something snarky, the other woman vanished into the crowd.
~*~
Itamish III, 2208
It was nearly sunset. She’d missed the funeral. Even though Buffy had known that she wouldn’t be able to attend – she couldn’t pass for Vulcan, even distantly, and she didn’t know any other race that was long-lived enough that she could use to justify the fact that she hadn’t aged for more than thirty years – she still wished that she could have been there.
Not that it would have mattered to Danny, of course. Most of him had died when a Romulan Bird-of-Prey had ambushed his ship and torn it to shreds. The bridge had sealed off from the rest of the ship, and they’d been the only ones to survive. Less than a dozen out of a crew of almost a hundred.
Buffy had been part of the rescue mission. When she’d seen him, battered, unconscious, half-dead from oxygen deprivation, she’d stopped in her tracks. Memories of more than a century earlier had flooded her mind. It had been a different war, a different place – but it had been Buffy standing over a broken body. Danny had looked so much like Dawn.
She didn’t look at the gravestone. Instead she looked at the sky, and watched as the sun gently slipped over the horizon. She didn’t turn around when she heard footsteps behind her.
“It was a fitting memorial,” Illyria said quietly. “Many people he’d served with arrived.”
“You were there?” Buffy didn’t take her eyes off the horizon.
“I thought that one of us should be.”
“Thank you.”
Illyria didn’t reply. Instead, she came to stand next to Buffy. Her gaze, too, was focused on the horizon. “She wasn’t there.”
“Mhm?”
“Your sister.”
There was a heavy weight in Buffy’s chest. It had been more than a hundred years, but sometimes she still ached. “I didn’t really expect anything but… it would have been nice.”
They stood in silence for a few moments longer as the sun finally set. There was no flicker of green energy in the sky. Nothing out of the ordinary. Just a sunset. The world was still spinning, just as it always did.
“I had hoped that she would be like us.”
Buffy looked down, closed her eyes, took a deep breath. She wouldn’t wish this existence on anyone. After a moment, when the band of pain wrapped around her heart had stopped squeezing quite so tightly, she looked over at Illyria.
Her hair was shorter than it had been thirty years ago, and there were no blue streaks in her hair or blue patches on her skin. Her ears were pointed. “You a Vulcan now?”
Illyria nodded. “I attached myself to the Vulcan Science Academy. I am now considered something of an expert in temporal anomalies.”
“You any closer to figuring out who’s messing around with time?”
“It is not, I believe, a result of Federation research. If it was, I would have been approached.”
“And you’re sure that it’s deliberate? Not some kind of real temporal anomaly?”
“I am.”
Buffy opened her mouth to ask how, but then she shut it again. She didn’t think that she’d understand if Illyria bothered to explain. “So who do you think is behind it?”
“Someone a very long way away. I have spent the last couple of decades trying to build a sensor sophisticated enough to detect exactly what is going on. Current technology doesn’t seem to be up to the task, but it has at least allowed me to establish that whatever is happening is far, far outside the range of the Federation’s purview.”
“Romulans?”
“Possibly. Given that I’ve exhausted the resources of the Academy, I thought I should have a look.”
“You’re planning on crossing the Neutral Zone? Good luck with that.”
“Luck is irrelevant. If one is willing to spend enough time in preparation, one does not need subject oneself to the whims of fate.”
“You must’ve fit in really well on Vulcan, huh?”
“Indeed.”
“You want me to come with you?”
“No. It would be illogical for both of us to travel together. In any case,” Illyria gestured at her ears as they shifted between pointed and rounded, “I am better suited for infiltration.”
“Maybe you’ll get to see what Romulans actually look like.”
“That seems likely.”
“Anyway, Blue, about this time breaking thing. Why’re you so hellbent on trying to work out what’s going on? It’s been happening for, what, thirty-five years now? There’s been a distinct lack of universe ending.”
“Where does the sun set, on this planet?”
“Uh, over there,” Buffy pointed. “East. You know, the direction that you were just looking at when you watched it set.” As she spoke, she had a momentary sense of discomfort. Language had changed quite a bit with the advent of easy space travel. There'd been a time when the sun had set in the west because that's what the west meant. It had been a long time since that was true - these days it was just a position in relation to magnetic north.
“How do you know it sets there?”
“Again, did you miss the part where we just saw it set?”
“You know that the sun sets in the east because it has always set in the east.”
“Sure. Let’s go with that.”
“And in what direction will the sun rise in the morning?”
“That sounds like a trick question, ‘cause you know I’m going to say west.”
“You know that the sun rises in the west because it has always risen in the west.”
“Are we getting to the point-having part yet?”
“Just because something has always happened before doesn’t mean that it will always happen again. When time breaks, only a fool or a god claims certainty about what will happen.”
Buffy sighed noisily. “You know, you could’ve just said that just because there hasn’t been a universe-shattering kaboom just yet doesn’t mean that mean that there won’t be one.”
“There may be a catastrophic outcome tomorrow. It may come in two centuries. I cannot be certain.” Buffy couldn’t miss the bitter edge to Illyria’s words. When time breaks, only a fool or a god claims certainty – Illyria had been a god once. Now, it was all she could do to feel that there was something happening at all.
“Okay. Fine. So you’re going on a crazy mission across the Neutral Zone and into Romulan space. When do you want me to come and pick you up when it all goes pear-shaped?”
“Twenty-five years should be sufficient,” Illyria said blandly.
“Great. I’ll mark it on the calendar.”
~*~
Chaltok IV, 2232
“It isn’t the Romulans.”
“Okay. Any idea who it might be?”
“I am still uncertain. Current data suggests that it might be somewhere in the Delta Quadrant.”
“As fun as this whole thing is, I’m not hunting through a quarter of the galaxy with you.”
“I will try to refine my data further. I’ll contact you again when I have something.”
“Cool, cool – anyway, now would probably be a good time to make our cunning getaway.”
“I agree.”
~*~
Marva IV, 2371
“I believe I have located the source of the repeated temporal alterations.”
Buffy whirled around, phaser in hand. “Prophets, Blue! Don’t sneak up on me like that!” She looked around at the other Maquis – half of them had their phasers out and trained on Illyria. “It’s fine, she’s a friend. I’ll vouch for her. I just didn’t expect to see her here.” The phasers were put away, but the suspicious looks weren’t. She was sure that there’d be a comprehensive background check done on Illyria by the time the conversation was over. She wondered what they’d find.
She grinned. They’d find whatever Illyria wanted them to find. “Been a long time. Seems like, what, a hundred and fifty years?” The Maquis would be eavesdropping on the conversation, she knew. She doubted that Illyria would care, but Buffy had made a home here. Best not to let them know how old she was.
“Something like that,” Illyria said, perfectly matching Buffy’s light and airy tone.
“So you’ve decided to leave the heady heights of academia and come grubbing with us grunts?”
“Certainly. I found what I was looking for, but given that it seems to be about 60,000 light years away it doesn’t seem like I can do anything about it. So I thought I’d throw in my lot with you.”
“You don’t have to sound so pleased about it.” Buffy grabbed Illyria’s arm and pulled her away. “Come. Let’s get you sorted out.”
~*~
As it turned out, that didn’t take much time. Illyria had been as thorough as always. Even so, it would take more than impeccable records and Buffy vouching for her for the Maquis to trust her. They’d been burned before. They wanted to give her a chance to prove herself.
“She can come with us,” Chakotay said. “Not much harm she can do out in the Badlands.”
~*~
“Why are you acting like you’re thinking about sticking around here?” Buffy asked, when she got a chance to be alone with the other woman. “You found what you were looking for, and you told me. Shouldn’t you go haring off now? If I don’t see you in, oh, a hundred and fifty years or so I’ll come looking for you.”
“Travelling alone seems unwise in this instance.”
“Why? It’s always been good enough for you before.”
“Before, I was operating within the borders of known space.”
“Sure, because the Romulan Empire was definitely something we knew about a hundred and fifty years ago,” Buffy said drily. “Come on. We didn’t even know they were Vulcan offshoots at the time.” She’d actually won a lot of money when that had come to light. There’d been a lot of betting about what Romulans looked like.
“Nevertheless, they were a known quantity. The Delta Quadrant is not.”
“Gotta say, a hundred and twenty year round trip with you doesn’t sound like my idea of a good time.”
“Nor is it mine. But it is the best option we have for dealing with the time alterations.”
“In case you haven’t noticed, we’re kind of busy here at the moment. Plus, your whole time breaking thing might never actually, you know, break. Or it might break right now. Whatever. Fact is, we don’t need to hurry.”
“Which is why I’m planning on staying here, until such time that you decide to come with me.”
Buffy scowled. She’d like to argue, but she knew Illyria. When she got an idea in her head, she was as stubborn as a rock.
On the other hand, Buffy could be stubborn too. “I’m not going to the Delta Quadrant with you. Not for a long time, if there’s anything I can do about it.”
~*~
As it turned out, there wasn’t. Being pulled across the galaxy by an incredibly advanced alien wasn’t something that she could really do anything about. She couldn’t even really blame Illyria for it.
She did anyway.