Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Adira Tal was working in Henry’s Garage today. They are normally off from high school most days. They had graduated early from math and science and had finished college for both, but Hugh insisted on staying in high school for English and history. Even though they should be done with both by now. Hugh also claimed they need more socialization with “kids their age.”

Henry’s Garage was a mix of an auto shop, a gas station, and a mechanic lab. Adira is pretty sure that Henry Deacon was currently working on one of his projects. Adira and Spencer were both closing up the windows shutters when they heard the phone ringing. Thinking that Henry would get it they both kept on closing up the windows shutters.

“ADIRA! SPENCER!”

“Coming!” They both replied, used to the things Henry does. Hoping to finish closing up the windows before one of them goes to pick up the phone.

“ADIRA! SPENCER! CAN ONE OF YOU GRAB THAT?” 

Spencer started mumbling, “Answer the phone, Spencer. Close the windows, Spencer” His mumbling cut off as Adira went to grab the phone. It stopped ringing, Adira will have to call whoever that was back. They continue to walk into Henry’s Garage but pause to put on their goggles as they see him starting to turn on his experiment. “Here goes nothing.”

Henry was so focused on his work that he didn’t even notice Adira walking in to get the now-silent phone. Henry spoke “Come on. Please, come on, baby. You can do this, yes. Come on. You can do this. Come on. Please? Please–YEAH!” He starts laughing enthusiastic about his project finally working. Adira started to laugh along as well. Henry’s machine started lifting up but the chins kept it in place.

Henry started to chant yes cheerfully, he started walking around the the machine and taking notes in his iconic small brown notebook. Adira stood afar knowing full well that Henry’s projects had a tendency to blow up. Spencer finally came into the room with them shouting “HENRY!”

Once he realized what was happening he put on his goggles too but did not take causation. Henry gestures for him to come closer to watch what was happening. Spencer did and Henry bent down to watch what was happening more closely with Spencer following. The machine was taking everything that was magnetic and bringing it closer but started to drop the items.

“No, no, no. No! No, no, no, no!” Henry said repeatedly while the garage started to shake.

A loud boom could probably be heard from the Town Center or Global Dynamics. The garage was a mess, but Henry didn’t seem to care as he was cheering and pumping his hands in the air. 

He stopped and looked around before calling out, “Adira? Spencer?” Adira got out from underneath the various things that fell during the explosion. The phone in their hand started to ring. They picked up as Henry was checking on Spencer.

They put the phone to their ear and spoke, “Hello?” 

“Adira, Lupo. Where’s Henry?” They wince knowing that Deputy Jo Lupo was probably not pleased about the explosion but Jo also knows that this is just what Henry does. 

They gave the phone to Henry and said, “It’s Jo.”

He picks it up, listens, and then replies, “Yeah, Jo, yeah, sure. Yeah, I’m on my way.” He paused waiting for Jo to finish then continues. “What explosion? I didn’t hear anything.” Then starts laughing as he hangs up the phone.

He starts walking outside clearly going to do the thing Jo called for. He turns around to both Adira and Spencer and says, “We’ll get it off the ground next time! You’ll see!” Before walking over to the Perkins RV that just drove into the gas station to talk to them.

Chapter Text

“Hey hey, Walter!” Henry was good friends with everybody in the town. Walter Perkins started to get out of the RV to talk to Henry. Walter Perkins was a scientist who worked at Global Dynamics. As Adira walked closer to the RV they noticed there were a lot of boxes piled up inside the RV.

Henry called out another name, “Susan!” Susan Perkins was a stay-at-home housewife but had her side jobs for fun. Adira would see her booth at the farmers market in the park. She would sell some of the best treats. Her treats were legendary, so much so that Vincent asked if he could make them for Café Diem with the profits going to her. Even though Café Diem doesn’t charge the residents. Café Diem is kind of like a cafeteria but you could order anything and they do mean anything. Global Dynamics pays for everything in Café Diem so technically Global Dynamics pays her for the recipes. She agreed and now the entire town could grab her amazing treats with their morning coffee but it still didn’t stop her from making them for the farmers market.

Walter slammed the RV door and said, “Morning, Henry!” Walter was running along next to Henry around the RV to open the side door.

“Give it another go, did we?” Henry asked.

“Almost, almost, almost got it this time,” Walter replied, opening the side door to show his wife, his kid, Brian, and the family dog, Nanook.

“Where y’all off to?”

“Uh, w-we’re just getting away for the weekend.” Walter seemed nervous and so did Susan and with all the boxes in the back it didn’t add up. They can’t be running off that against protocol, they aren’t trapped here but you can’t run off with classified documents and materials. Walter elaborated, “You know, a little quality time with the family.” Susan nodded along to her husband's words. Walter clarified, “We’ll be back though.” Not at all suspicious.

Henry responded with “Okay then.” Suspicious too but just decided to brush off the concern. “Hey hey, Brian! Come on, Give me some!” holding his hand down with his palm up so Brian can low five him. “All right. You know what, man? Putting his hand on Brian’s arm, “I don’t know who’s growing faster.” Seeing more boxes through the door he monently paused then continued. “Um… you or that pup.” Brian smiled at him showing his teeth seeing that he was missing his front two teeth. Susan quickly closed the door hoping that Henry didn’t notice all the boxes.

Susan started laughing nervously and asked, “Who wants treats for the road?”

Brian with an, “I do!” then saw Adira and squealed in excitement. Adira babysat for Brian on Walter and Susan’s date nights or when Susan was doing a book club and Walter was working late. “Adira!!!” he ran towards them and gave them a big hug.

“Adira!! Look I lost another tooth!” he opened his mouth and pointed to the empty spot where a tooth should have been.

“Wow! Soon you’ll be getting you’re adult teeth!” They smiled at him and somehow his smile widened more then they thought it could. Brian was a sweet kid, Gray always liked him. In fact, Gray was leaning against the RV. Nobody can see Gray except for them. Gray smiled at the both of them. “You’re so good with kids, Adira. You’ll definitely be an amazing parent!” Adira blushed but didn’t answer back. It was common for Gray to say embarrassing things about them and he knew exactly what to say.

“Do you want a piggyback ride, Brian?” Quickly asking him so Gray would stop.

“Yes! Yes! Yes!” He said excitedly. Adira crouched down so Brian could get onto their back and then stood up holding his legs. He put his arms around their neck and giggled, Adira did too. They saw Susan smiling at them. The family dog, Nanook, which was a husky puppy but was already big, almost full-sized started to follow Adira and Brian to the store.

Susan lagged behind to say something to Henry but Adira was too far to hear. Henry responded back to her before she ran off. Gray watched her go before following.

Adira opened the door to the shop with Nanook and Susan behind them. They set Brian down and then went behind the counter where Spencer was. His face was covered in grime from the explosion, Adira looked in their small pocket mirror and saw they their face was clean. They looked back up to see Gray sitting on the counter looking at Brian and Susan. Adira looked over at what Spencer was doing which was him being weird. He had a year old magazine open to Ms. DNA from 2005. He looked at it like it was a picture of a girl in a bathing suit but it was strands of DNA shown. Adira was pretty sure that Spencer said, “Nice.”

Adira turned their attention to Gray. They looked at him with a look of ‘What is this dude doing?’ Gray looked back at them and said, “Spencer weird, I heard him talking about that movie “They Came to Conquer,” and he said he was going to use the satellites to watch it early.”

Adira hated Spencer’s movie nights not because they were bad but because they were loud. You could probably hear the movie from the next state over. They have no clue on how Spencer wasn’t deaf yet.

Gray went back to looking at Brian and his mother while they went to read their book. They heard the bell ringing and looked up to see Walter walked in and Brian walked out. Susan told Brian, “Just wait in the motor home, honey.”

Adira quickly said, “Bye Brian, have a nice trip!”

“Bye Adira!” Gave a quick wave showing the apple he had in his hand. He then looked at Nanook and said, “Come on, boy.” Then continued walking to the RV before the door slammed shut.

Adira looked past Spencer and saw Henry driving away in the red tow truck. Walter and Susan started whispering to each other, Gray got up from his seat on the counter and began to be nosy. Since nobody could see or hear the boy, he took that as a chance to A. Be a menace. B. Bored and has nothing to do most of the time. Or C. Both. Knowing Gray it was most likely C.

Although Adira wouldn’t admit it right now they were interested in what was happening with the family.

Gray started to tell Adira what was happening, “Henry knows something’s wrong.” They assumed that it was Walter speaking as Susan had her mouth closed.

Susan looked like she was claiming down her husband when Gray spoke again, “Well, maybe we should just reconsider. Tell them what happened. I’m sure they’ll understand.”

Walter started to speak again and Gray helpful told Adira, “No. It’s too late for that.”

“But you said yourself we will never have another opportunity like this.”

Walter gave a worried glance to the counter Adira looked like they were reading and Spencer was still looking at Ms. DNA. “I know. But you gotta trust me, Susan. This isn’t just about us... Not anymore.”

Gray started to speak breaking from the Perkins conversation, “Now they are just telling each other to act normal and ‘buy some things’.”

Adira and Gray’s attention focused on all the gravity globes sitting in front of the window. The globes were moving, they weren’t supposed to move unless someone touched them. Nobody was even near them. The globes started to move at a rapid pace, something wasn’t right. However is anything really normal in Eureka? The RV started flashing blue through the windows, they were speechless.

As quickly as it started, it stopped. Adira dropped the thought of anything weird happening, it might have been an after effect of Henry’s experiment. It could also be Brian playing with a flashlight with a blue tint and something else causing the globes to move. The Perkins paid and left the store, thinking it was going to be silent for the rest of the day. They started to open their book when they heard screams.

“BRIANN!!!! BRIAN!!!!!!” Walter and Susan’s screams broke the silence. Spencer finally coming back to reality dropped the magazine, noticing that Adira had already run outside the store to check what was wrong. That's when they saw it.

The RV back was missing but the missing part appeared to be in the shape of a spear. It wasn't only the RV missing, some of the pavement was gone too.

Brian was gone and so was Nanook. With the RV missing plus Brian and Nanook it didn't spell anything good.

Adira pulled out their PDA to call Sheriff Cobb and Deputy Lupo.

“Lupo”

“Hi, um, can you please come to Henry’s Garage? Brian Perkins has gone missing.”

“What? When?”

“Around two minutes ago...”

Adira heard an alarm blaring from the other side of the phone, “Okay, just keep everybody there. We’re on our way.”

Adira looked at Spencer, “Spencer keep them calm. Jo told me not to let anyone leave, they should be here soon.” Gray followed Spencer to make sure everything would be alright and to alert Adira if anything went wrong.

Adira took a couple of breaths calming themselves before saying, “Everything will be alright it’s just another day in Eureka.”

Chapter Text

In less than 5 minutes Sheriff Cobb and Deputy Lupo were at Henry’s Shop. Sheriff Cobb got out of the driver's seat while Deputy Lupo got out of the passenger seat. Both doors slammed loudly Sheriff Cobb went over to the RV where Walter and Susan Perkins were with Spencer and themselves. Spencer and Adira were both trying to calm down the Perkins as best they could considering.

Adira looked at Walter and Susan and said, “Look Sheriff Cobb is here he will help us find Brian. Everything will be okay, alright?”

Walter responded as Susan was in too much shock, “Okay.”

Sheriff Cobb asked, “What is the situation here?”

“Brian’s gone...” Susan whispered.

“What?”

Adira spoke up, “Brian’s gone, Sheriff. We don’t know if he was taken with the RV or if he ran out of fright. We don’t know if he was taken and the RV is a distraction. Nanook is gone too he might have run off with him...” Adira was thinking of all the possibilities of what could have happened, the Sheriff broke them out of their spiral.

“Oh, this isn’t good.” The Sheriff looked over at Jo who was getting things out of the trunk and yelled, “JO!! Call the Fire Department. Brian Perkins is missing, find people who will help search.”

“ON IT!” She responded dropping what she grabbed and using her Personal Digital Assistant, PDA to call the Fire Department.

The Sheriff looked back at the group and asked, “What happened up to Brian’s disappearance? Did you see anyone suspicious? Anything out of the ordinary?”

“Well, I didn’t see anything...” Adira hit him with their elbow. “Ow, what was that for?”

“You weren’t even paying attention! You were just staring at your dumb magazine!”

“Alright, Adira can you tell me what happened? Maybe anything that Gray saw?” The Sheriff looked at them hoping that they saw something to point them in the right direction.

Adira started to recount everything that happened since Henry’s experiment when they first saw the Perkins. By the time they were done and Walter recounted what happened after they got into the RV people were already here to help find the missing boy. Sheriff Cobb had his arm over Walter and walked him away when Jo appeared.

“I got your gun.”

“No guns.” The Sheriff waved her off as he continued to walk with Walter back to Susan. He gave Susan a big hug, “Susan.”

Jo tried to defend the reason for having a gun. “But it’s a small one.” If she was referring to the gun over her shoulder it was not small. Jo was a bit gun-obsessed and it showed.

Sheriff Cobb stayed firm, “No.” He looked back at Walter and Susan, “We're gonna find him, okay? You two need each other now. You just stay with each other.”

The Sheriff looked at the crowd and spoke with a loud voice, ”All right, what I would like to do is organize you into three groups.” He pointed to the trees, “Everyone see the tree line?”

Jo spoke up and everyone turned to the tree line, “You guys see the tree line? It's right over there.”

Sheriff Cobb continued, “What we're gonna do is we're gonna sweep towards the tree line.”

Adira was told to stay there in case someone did kidnapped Brian. While they are a teenager, Sheriff Cobb thought it would be better for them to stay so they wouldn’t get grabbed too. Spencer who was older was going along with one of the three groups to search for Brian. Adira hoped Brian would be found soon.

By this point, the RV was tarped up so no one could see the missing piece. Adira was near enough to see everything happening around the RV. Gray was next to them, he was concerned about Brian, everyone was. In Eureka, a kid disappears and a piece of the RV he was in gone too doesn’t spell out anything good.

“Hey, Adira?” Adira hummed back in response. “What do you think happened?”

“I don’t know... but all I know is it's not good.”

“Henry’s back, maybe he has something to help us?”

Adira looked over and saw Henry pulled up in his red tow truck with a car towed to it. Henry got out of the driver's seat and an unfamiliar dirty blonde haired guy with pale skin get out of the passenger side. This man looked like he had gone through some things, his shirt was unbuttoned and his blazer was very dirty.

Henry and the man started to walk up to the Sheriff. They heard Jo say, “Here comes the cavalry.”

Sheriff Cobb muttered, “Oh, great. That's all I need.”

“Hey, Sheriff, what's going on?” asked the unfamiliar man.

“Uh, there's a boy missing.”

“Is he lost or was he kidnapped?”

The Sheriff responded, “We don't know. We don't know at this point.”

“Okay. Um, call Highway Patrol.” The unfamiliar man took off his blazer, “What you're gonna want are roadblocks on all the major arteries and,” he moved his blazer to Jo. “Hold that.” He dropped the blazer expecting Jo to hold it, not realizing that it dropped to the floor. “And put Search and Rescue guys to comb the...”

Sheriff Cobb interrupted the man to tell him, “Your jacket's on the ground.”

Jo was pissed by the man, “We've all seen The Fugitive, Marshal. How about you let us take care of this?” The man looked at the Deputy and then picked his jacket off the ground.

So the man is a Marshal, that explains a bit. He must have been passing though when something happened to his car. This Marshal was not ready for the ride this town would take him on.

“I don't wanna step on any toes, sir, but I do have a lot of experience at this kind of thing.”

Sheriff Cobb looked at the Marshal intently, “Trust me, you don't.” The Sheriff called out, “Henry?”

Henry responded, “Yeah, one minute.” He was talking to Perkins.

“Okay.” Sheriff Cobb and Deputy Lupo walked away to sweep through the forest

The Marshal put his jacket back on and went to look in the RV. Gray followed, Adira wished they could see what the Marshal was doing too but they knew they would be spotted.

Gray started to narrate for them, “The Marsal said, ’Wow’ and is now looking around the RV... OH! Allison Blake is here!” Allison being here wasn’t unusual, she was apart of the D.O.D. She is a government liaison between Eureka and the Pentagon. When something goes wrong in this little town she was there.

“She’s asking the Mashal something, ‘Looking for something? You know you're disturbing an active crime scene?’.”

“‘Well, actually, I'm investigating an active crime scene. Jack Carter, U.S. Marshal.’ Jack flipped open his badge. This Jack Carter, he seems like he knows what he’s doing.”

“‘Allison Blake, Department of Defense.’”

“‘Hmm. I didn't see that coming.’”

“‘Well, now that we're done with the introductions, Mr. Carter –’“

“Oh my god, he’s trying to flirt! ‘Well, actually, it's Marshal Carter, but you can call me Jack.’”

“‘Hey, I don't like to repeat myself.’”

“‘Yet something tells me you're going to. Wow, you see, I've seen some strange stuff. This is why the D.O.D. is out here in the middle of nowhere?’ Oh no, he’s getting suspicious.”

“‘I'm not at liberty to say.’“

“‘Come on, Miss Blake, we're on the same team.‘“

“‘That's Agent Blake, Marshal, and we're not even in the same league. This is way out of your jurisdiction.’”

“‘Actually, I'm a U.S. Marshal, so technically, the United States is my jurisdiction. Careful, though, wouldn't want you disturbing an active crime scene.’”

“‘Look– Brian’ Adira! I think they found a bloody hand print!” Oh god.

“‘The missing boy?’”

“‘Yeah’ Oh no please don’t do that! He has taken a piece of the blood and licked it. Thank you Allison! She said ‘What are you doing?‘ She is always the voice of reason.”

“‘Relax, it's not blood.’ Oh, thank god.” Adira sighed in relief.

“‘Then what?’”

“‘Chocolate. Hershey's Big Block with almonds.‘ Sneaky little kid.“

“‘How could you possibly know that?‘“

“He showed the empty candy wrapper to Allison, ‘Believe it or not, I have done this before. But there's one small detail I usually like to ascertain before launching a full-scale manhunt for a missing person.’”

“‘And that would be?’”

“‘That there is, in fact, a person missing.’ He opened the backseat compartment, ‘Hi, Brian.’ Adira! He’s fine!”

Adira let out another sigh of relief, if he did that again they would not babysit Brian ever again.

Brian was led out of the RV by the Marshal and Allison Blake. Gray walked back to Adira, they were both relieved that the kid was okay. There could have been much worse fates than this.

Brian ran to his mom who they were pretty sure never let go of him again. Allison was explaining what happened to Sheriff Cobb.

“Brian. Brian!” Sheriff Cobb yelled trying to get the boy’s attention, “Were you hiding in the RV the whole time?”

“Yes!” The boy said before going to look back at his mom.

Sheriff Cobb shook his head and Allison said, “Everybody missed it.”

“Not everybody.” He looked over at the Marshal who just stepped in some mud.

Allison looked at the Marshal and then back to Sheriff Cobb, “Uh, I guess he's smarter than he looks.”

“You know what? I'm gonna let Jo handle him.”

Alison rejected the man’s offer, “No, no, I’ll handle him.”

“No, Jo. She’s perfect.” Trying to convince Allison to let Jo handle it. “No, Jo!”

“I need you to stay focused on finding what caused this.”

“Jo!”

“Sheriff.”

“Jo!”

“Sheriff... Please.” The Sheriff walked away resigning himself, Allison sighed and looked over at the dirty Marsal, “Look like you really stepped in it, Marshal.”

“It wouldn’t be the first time.”

“I suppose I should thank you”

Instead of him saying you're welcome he asked a question, “How about you tell me what’s going on here instead?”

“Sorry, Marshal, but–”

“Yeah, I know. You’re not at liberty to say.”

Henry suddenly called out, “Oh, hey, Marshal?” Looking back at the car to evaluate, “Um, one– Oh, I don’t know. Maybe two days.” He dropped the car off the tow truck, it dropped with a loud clang. The tires were flat and the car looked horrible. Spencer laughed from the top of the tow truck. Henry looked back at the car before replying, “Three days max.”

The Marshal looked in shock but Allison just looked at the man and said, “You may be here a while.”

The Marshal looking tired of this small town spoke, “I’m getting that impression.”

Allison started walking to her car, “Come on. I have a place you can stay.”

“Really?”

“I’ll drive.” Ah, Allison was taking the Marshal to Beverly's Bed & Breakfast. Beverly is one of the two town’s therapists. Hugh was the other one, Hugh mainly works with people who are working throughout the inside GD while still on shifts. Beverly works with everyone including GD, government officials, and even a couple presidents. Normally she works with people when they are off their shifts, more time to talk, She is mainly the town’s go-to.

The Sheriff was on the radio talking to someone, “Yeah, no, you can turn around. Yeah. Taggart, go home. We found Brian.” Taggart is Eureka's veterinarian, he knows everything about wildlife. He is pretty intense with it. When Adira told him about how one of the past hosts, Jovar, and his love of birds, Taggart tried to get Adira to birdwatch with him constantly. While they would be fine for an hour or two Taggart usually meant the entire day.

“Sheriff?”

“Yeah?”

“That's not all we found. Better come take a look.”

The Sheriff got in his car and went to check out what Taggart found.

Gray looked at them and asked, “Adira? Can we home?”

“Let me call Hugh and Paul first and tell them that everything is fine before they hear it from Vincent. Then I’ll check with Henry and see if I can go.” Gray nodded and Adira pulled out their PDA to call their dads.

Adira clicked to call Paul first, it rang for a while before Paul picked it up. “Hey Kiddo, what’s up?”

“Hey, everything is fine now. The was a situation at Henry’s Shop but it’s all good now.”

“Oh yeah, Hugh heard about the explosion from a patient. Not hurt are you? Hugh wouldn’t let you go back working there for months if something happened.”

“I’m not hurt, but...”

Paul sounded more concerned, “What happened?”

Adira reassured him, “Everything is fine now but Brian Perkins went missing, BUT they found him so everything is okay!”

He gave a sigh of relief, “Oh thank god that kid was found.” Now Paul was questioning them, “But he went missing at Henry’s Shop?”

They started to explain what happened, “The Perkins were getting some snacks for their weekend trip, but Gray and I noticed something was off with them.”

“What was off with them?”

“There were boxes stacked to the ceiling of their RV and Susan was trying to convince Walter to ‘Tell them what happened.’ It seemed like they were running from something.”

Paul hummed in agreement, “You and Gray are right something definitely seems off. How did Brian disappear?”

“Okay get this, a piece of the RV was taken off in a perfect sphere even some of the road was taken with it. We don’t know where the missing piece is. Brian was in the RV when it happened and hid in the storage under the seat.”

He paused for a minute, they assumed that he was processing what they said. He responded “Wow even in Eureka that's weird, and let me guess you some of this because of Gray snooping?”

“Yes,” They said sheepishly but contuined, “but here’s the thing Sheriff Cobb nor Dupety Lupo found him. It was a Marshal named Jack Carter who crashed here and whose car was being towed by Henry. When they got back it took 3 minutes to find him all the Marshal’s work.”

“Well, I guess the town needs to thank this man.” Adira laughed.

They asked, “Are we still planning on eating at Café Diem?”

“I think so. Hugh said it wasn’t that busy when we last talked. I’ll go and check then I will text you back. If we are unable to make it still go and get lunch at Café Diem. See you Kiddo.” If Paul was going to talk to Hugh in a few minutes then they wouldn’t call him.

“Bye, Paul!”

Chapter Text

Adira pocketed their PDA and looked at Gray, “Alright, I'm going to check in with Henry.” By this point, Deputy Lupo rounding people up and escorting them back into their cars away from Henry’s Shop. This left Adira weaving through a crowd of people to get to Henry. When they finally saw Henry he was looking at The Marshal's car. He was trying to identify what needed to be replaced.

“Hey, Adira! Our Marshal friend really helped us out, didn’t he?”

“Yeah, he did...” Adira smiled realizing that Brian could have been missing for a lot longer if it weren’t for that Marshal. “None of us even thought to look in the RV.”

“Well, then it’s a very good thing that he crashed here! While I don’t really believe in fate, I think something brought him here for a reason.”

“Maybe, Henry, but let's be thankful that Brian is safe and sound. Although they still have to find Nanook.”

“He probably just ran off, Taggart will find him. Easier to catch than Lowjack.” Henry laughed. Lowjack is the Local Hazard. He is a 130 IQ stray dog from Global Dynamics. Lowjack is commonly on the road a lot, he has been the cause of many crashes. Adira wouldn’t be surprised if that's the reason Jack Carter crashed his car.

“Yeah no doubt, I was wondering if I can go?”

“OH! Right!” Henry checks his watch, “Yeah go ahead, I'm going to tinker on the car. I’ll probably see you at Café Diem later. Are you going to walk or will someone pick you up? I can drop you off if you want?”

“Thanks Henry, but I think I'm going to walk, clear my head. See you, Henry! Good luck on the Car!” Henry nodded and waved to them. Adira waved back and went to grab their stuff from the gas station. They walked in to see Spencer.

Spencer had washed up all the soot from his face from Henry’s experiment, that all felt so long ago. Spencer was behind the counter, “Today has been a very eventful day hasn’t it?”

“Took the words out of my mouth.” They went to retrieve their backpack from under the cabinet and set it on the counter. Adira dug threw their bag to find a couple things but mainly their necklace. Once they retrieved it they put it on. They didn’t like to wear it when working as they had a fear of losing the necklace holding two rings on its chain.

Spencer asked Adira, “Do you want to come over for movie night on Thursday? We are watching the next episode of Supernatural.”

“Not really, I would like to keep my hearing, thanks.”

“Come on movie nights are not that loud.” Spencer was trying to convince them but failing. While Vincent would be there with his amazing food and their friend Fargo, they would never go to one of Spencer's movie nights. The first and last time they did they had a headache for the rest of the night and the next day.

“Yes they are, and besides Hugh, Paul, and I are going to watch the show together. I think this week TIlly, Micheal, Book, Jett, Tracy, and of course, Queen Grudge are all joining.” Adira was looking in their bag to make sure everything was in there. They grabbed their water bottle and took a sip. They grabbed a thing of string cheese to snack on. “See you, Spencer!” Adira walked out and went to wave bye at Henry when he motioned for them to come over.

Adira walked over, “Hey Henry, I'm about to go. Need anything?”

Henry looked a bit concerned, “You sure that you want to walk? I can drive you to Café Diem.”

Adira knew that Henry was concerned about them. With the things that happened today, they understand why. So they gave in, “If you want to drive me over that's fine.”

He smiled and then said excitedly, “Get in and we can talk!”

Adira smiled back and went to the passenger side of the tow truck. They set their backpack by their feet and opened their cheese stick. They started peeling a piece of cheese off when Henry entered the car.

“Alright, put on your seatbelt or Hugh will kill me.”

Adira shoved the piece of cheese stick they had in their mouth and quickly put on their seatbelt with one hand. The other hand was holding their cheese stick. They went back to peeling the string cheese and eating it, Henry turned on the car and started driving to Café Diem.

It was silent in the truck until Henry spoke, “Soo how have GD and school been?”

“It's been good just busy, you know how it is.” They paused to finish their string cheese then continued, “It's been mainly fixing stuff around GD going into vents and fixing stuff in there as Hugh has banned Paul from going in there. Jett refuses to go in there as well.”

Henry laughed his big laugh, “We're old! Our bones don’t work like that anymore.”

Adira rolled their eyes jokingly, “I am mentally old! My brain still works.”

Henry gave a big jovial laugh, “Wasn’t Senna around before Eureka was even considered to be a town?”

“Yeah, he was! I can tell you it looked very different than what it is today!”

“What used to be in some places?”

“Well, Café Diem used to be an air base. Do you want me to tell you everything? Can’t you go to the Eureka museum?”

“I could but you have a first-hand account of the founding of Eureka! Sure papers and documents tell us some things but you could tell us more!”

“I could tell you about the Declaration of Independence.” Adira blurted out they looked at Henry who looked at them for a second then looked at them again. He was clearly doing a double-take.

“Wait really? Tal was around that long ago?” A slight disbelief in his voice.

“Yeah... Like I said mentally old.” Adira shrugged.

“Ok, now I think we need to interview you.”

Fuck, Adira is now realizing they really shouldn’t have said that. “Oh, golly. What fun.” They spoke with a sarcastic voice.

“Come on, it won’t be too bad! We’ll get ice cream or other sweets from Vincent, and go to the museum so we can record Tal’s stories! Tal is of significant importance to history and it would be wonderful to have someone who can tell us day-to-day life in that time!” The sweets sounded enticing but they really didn’t want to do it.

Henry spoke up again, “I will buy, uh what do you call them worms on a string? They have an actual name. Right! Squirmles! You can cause more terror with them.” Henry found the worms amusing as did most people.

The most terror they caused with little worms was just leaving them in various places for their friends to find. Well, that was the most terror caused to the public. They got over a hundred of them and attached them to the fan in their room. Now every time they turn on their fan the worms spin.

Adira also has their own worm and their name was Squmble. Gray also has his own worm and his name was Snake. Squmble and Snake both stayed in Adira’s backpack.

Adira put their head back on the headrest, looked over at Henry, and then spoke, “Fine, you have successfully bribed me. You know I can't resist candy and my little worms.” Damn, their sugar tooth and their love for those little fuzzy worms.

“Yes! Alright, I will talk to the curator about interviewing you. Once I have talked to them I will tell you dates for it!” Henry was excited. He dabbled in a little bit of everything, such as rocket engineering. He worked in any kind of engineering but he worked with NASA for many years. He was a main contributor on many space missions.

Something Adira always found funny was Henry's mechanic scrubs. Right now he had a mechanic patch on, but one of his pockets had a lot of patches to have all his jobs. Whenever he worked on something different he would rip off the patch and swap it out.

Gray suddenly spoke, “You dug yourself into this hole. Not me.” Adira jumped in their seat, they forgot that Gray was in the car with them. Gray can be really quiet at times. When he was that quiet they assumed that he disappeared. This usually happens when Adira is doing work. Gray will disappear somewhere, they don’t know where. When they asked where he goes Gray just shrugged.

Henry looked over at them confused, “Are you ok?”

Adira stuttered, “Y-Yeah I’m-I am fine. Gray accidentally scared me.” They should be used to it by now but they weren’t. When they get scared they don’t fight or flight they just freeze.

Gray apologized, “Sorry! I didn’t mean to! Also when we get home can we watch a movie?”

“It is alright Gray. I know it was an accident, and I guess we can.”

Henry spoke, “How are you Gray? We haven’t seen each other recently.”

Gray laughed at Henry’s joke, “Good! Just here as always. Wishing Adira would go out for adventures.”

Adira sighed and repeated what Gray said, “Good. Just here as always. He’s wishing I would go out,” They made air quotes, “For adventures.”

Henry let out one of his joyful laughs, “There are a lot of adventures here Gray! But I know you want to really experience it. Speaking of how is it going?”

“It's going good so far, nothing near to a body but something close. We have been trying to replicate that hologram project that registered Gray but since it went up into flames we have been starting from scratch.”

Henry nodded and hummed before asking, “How is the hologram going so far?”

Adira replied, “It's going pretty good!” They asked Henry, “You know that project Fargo is working on? S.A.R.A.H.?”

“Yeah, the Self Actuated Residential Automated Habitat? The bunker house, right?”

“Well in exchange for me to use S.A.R.A.H. processing power to test the hologram program and the hardware needed for it. I have to check his code and make sure that S.A.R.A.H.’s code is good. The first couple attempts went a tad poorly. Although I think I have found the root of the problem so I am going to work on that tonight and test it again.”

“That's amazing! I can’t wait to see you again Gray!” He gave one of his big smiles. It was infectious, Adira and Gray smiled back. Henry was the glue of this town and it was obvious to everyone, but sometimes Adira wonders if he knew how important he was to this town.

“We are very excited, but this is the first step in making a real body for Gray. We are hoping after this works not only Gray will be back but this could also help people with organ failures and many other diseases.” Adira paused to take a breath then continued, “This could revolutionize medicine and help millions of people!”

Adira looked outside the car window to see the familiar town of Eureka. They were driving down Main Street, past all the shops: the dry cleaner, the jewelry shop, and the gym. Soon enough they were in front of Café Diem. The favored café was a play on words like many other places in Eureka. The name Café Diem comes from the Latin phrase “Carpe Diem” which means seize the day.

Henry parked the big red truck in a spot in front of the local café, “Alrighty kids, we have arrived at your destination!”

Adira grabbed their things and opened the car door. “Thank you, Henry!” They hopped out of the vehicle and turned to look at the man, “Are you going to come in or...” Adira trailed off.

He replied, “Nah, I am going to work on the Marshal’s car but remember the interview at the museum!”

Gray chirped in, “Bye Henry! It was nice talking to you!”

Adira answered back, “Yes, remember the bribes! You have to find a good date for it. Also Gray said, ‘Bye and it was nice talking to you!’ I will see you soon Henry!”

“See you Kiddos!” Adira closed the door to the car and walked onto the sidewalk to get out of Henry’s way. They gave a wave and saw the car go down Main Street.

Adira looked across the street to the Sheriff's office. It was empty. Jo must be busy gathering the people who were helping to find Brian and telling them to go home. Though Adira wonders where the Sheriff is. Probably looking at whatever Taggart found. Trying not to think of the various things Taggart could have found wherever he is, they turn back around to the café.

They look through the window of Café Diem to see Gray sitting on the main counter. He was swinging his legs as he watched the busy café. They walked through the door and sat down on one of the barstools.

“Hey, Vince!”

“Adira! I have heard from a little birdy that your morning was eventful!” The owner of the beloved café is known for his love of gossip and his amazing dishes.

Adira laughed, “It has! No, Vince, I have no gossip. And before you ask Brian is ok but Nanook has yet to be found. I am pretty sure Taggart is on it.”

“Well, that’s amazing. I have yet to see your dads since this morning.” Vincent said helpfully

“They should be here soon. At least if something hasn’t come up at GD. Dad said Papi wasn’t busy in medical but that could have changed.”

“Well, I hope to see them again soon. Do you have an idea on what you want to have?”

“Uhh... I don’t really know..” They turned to look at Gray who was still sitting on the counter, “What do you think?”

Gray gave them a childish grin and said, “You should get a grilled cheese! Oh! You know what also sounds good?”

“What’s that Gray?”

“Apple juice!!”

Adira tilted their head and thought. “That does sound good...”

They turned their head back to Vincent, “Gray said grilled cheese and apple juice, and that sounds really good!”

“Coming up!” Vincent went back into the kitchen and Adira got up from the bar and sat at an empty booth.

Gray jumped off the counter and sat next to Adira in the booth. Gray asked, “So after lunch what’s that plan?”

“Uhhh... If Dad doesn’t need me to help at GD I think we will go home. I am going to make sure that everything is good with the hologram code and the hardware. I will put on a movie and then we will test out the hologram at S.A.R.A.H. whenever Dad and Papa get back home.

“Ok!” He then asked, “What movie are we going to watch?”

Adira responded, “You pick.”

“High School Musical!”

They smiled at Gray and said, “Alrightly then High School Musical it is!”