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[ Claire is sitting at her desk in the clinic and clears her throat as the video comes up. ]

Good afternoon. I realize there have been quite a few concerns regarding the announcement of war, but unless I've simply missed it, I haven't seen anything specifically regarding triage. We don't know what sort of battle this may be, and perhaps it won't be needed. That's just it though, we don't know, and personally, I would rather be prepared.

As for my credentials, I've been a war medic. I've seen my share of fighting, and I have a medical degree, I'm a surgeon. What I would like is for those who can heal to be people I can count on. Since the last time I've requested this, individuals have come and gone, I'd like to be sure of our assets if you're willing. If not, there's no reason to feel you must.

I can train those of you who might like to learn basic first aid, I'll be in the clinic, and I'll be available here as well if you'd like to have a conversation via the device. Thank you for your time.

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"A pleasure. Maggie is fine." She isn't particularly formal, especially when Garcia carries so much weight in the medical community back home. Maggie likes to divert attention from her surname most of the time.

She deals with a lot of difficult subjects by addressing them as cheerfully as possible, especially around people she doesn't know well, but Maggie gathers a bit more composure around her to strike a balance between serious and at ease. It's probably best not to chirp at people about the walking dead.

"Yes. Most bodily fluids, including blood, hence my concern. Every mammal on my world is infected with what I'll call the unamplified or dormant version. It came about twenty seven years ago when a cure for cancer and a cure for the common cold combined and mutated. They did work. I'm immune to both of those diseases. But I have a new one."

"I'm sorry, a blanket cure for all cancer?" She has no idea how far in the future this woman is from, but that's fascinating, and as a doctor, she can't help but be curious. "How did everyone get the infection?" It had to be a water supply or something in the air, at least that's what she's assuming.

"And the trade-off is that now you'll remain cold and cancer free but you're fated to something worse? What does the new disease entail if it's mostly dormant?"

"The Kellis flu, which cured the common cold, was released into atmosphere by criminals who broke into Dr. Kellis' lab before human testing had even begun, let alone been finished. It interacted with Marburg Amberlee, a modified hemorrhagic fever that was being used very successfully in cancer trials. The Kellis flu was designed to be contagious, so that once it was released it would spread naturally, and unfortunately their offspring picked up a lot of that trait. The virus isn't airborne at this point, but every mammal in my version of Earth is infected."

Maggie purses her lips. "It raises the dead. And they don't come back with much on their minds besides hunger." A zombie virus, in other words, if Claire has any familiarity with pop culture or the events in Wonderland that have featured them.

Well, that's certainly a lot at once, and Claire lets out a breath, putting down her pen.

"I've gone through a handful of events with the undead, I'm familiar," she says with some regret in her voice. She'd rather not be.

"What I'm guessing, then, is that dying for you, in any matter, means returning?"

"Not if I'm shot in the head." In other words, if Maggie dies, make sure she doesn't get up again.

"The real danger is blood. Even if I don't die, there's a chance that my blood can carry a high enough viral load to make zombies out of whoever comes into contact with it. Not just the dormant form of the virus, the amplified form. I'd be much more comfortable with anyone treating me, Shaun Mason, or Georgia Mason wearing a mask and safety glasses as well as gloves. Then you're mostly safe unless it gets into an open cut."

Please don't convert and eat her in the middle of providing her medical attention, thank you.

"This reminds me of what I've read of the AIDS epidemic. I haven't lived it yet, but in updating myself here, It sounds similar though with vastly different results in the end."

Still, she's making notes and she's already thinking as she writes the names down. "It would help to be familiar with the faces of both Shaun and Georgia, but I hardly think they want to be paraded around or for the knowledge to become public." Claire wouldn't, and even if they don't mind, as a doctor the last thing she wants to do is violate any sort of trust. "If something happens and you know you've suffered a mortal wound, do you have any...precautions in place?"

She knows Olivia has asked her, if it comes down to it, to shoot her in the head - along with others in case Claire herself finds herself unable to do it.

It isn't a comparison that would have occurred to Maggie unprompted. "That was awhile ago, by my timeline, but I've read enough to see a few similarities. I'm from 2041."

Maggie grew up in a society where government-regulated blood tests were a regular part of life, and safety came before privacy. She and her teammates err a little less toward the fanatic safety extremes, but they still all agree that preventing public health crises is important. The request for photos wasn't necessary.

She shuffles through the papers she brought down with her until she gets to a page with photos of all three of them. Shaun's has big bold text below it stating, 'Do not shoot. Essentially a carrier; still contagious, but will not amplify and attack anyone.' The medical staff can afford to wait a little longer before giving Shaun up as a lost cause than they could safely manage with Maggie or Georgia.

"You can shoot me, if you're willing. Shaun or Georgia would do it, if you can get them down here fast enough. I haven't asked anyone else yet."

"You're from two hundred and seventy-three years in my future. If I count the time I arrived here from." It's only a bit over how far back she'd traveled in time. Christ.

Taking the information, she reads it all before looking at Maggie. "I would certainly rather it didn't come to that. But I've promised another. I can promise you the same."

It would never give her any pleasure or satisfaction, and it reminds her of poor, young, Elias Pound. Dead because she didn't recognize the symptoms of typhoid him, and as a result, having to pierce his nose with a hook to wrap him and deliver him to the sea. It should always be done by a friend.

Shaking herself out of her thoughts, she looks at her new acquaintance. "I respect your honesty and that you would come here in person to let me know all of this."

Maggie smiles in thanks for the compliment, telling Claire, "I'm a writer, but my parents own a pharmaceutical company. My family takes public health seriously. And I have no desire to live through a zombie uprising in Wonderland, so there's as much self interest in this visit as civic mindedness."

She noticed one thing that seemed off in what Claire said, though. "The time you arrived from?"

"It's only too bad that Wonderland enjoys bringing zombies here," she says with a heavy sigh before refocusing on Maggie's question.

"Yes, that. I'm an accidental time traveler. I was born in the 20th century, was a nurse in the second world war and shortly after it was over, I traveled back in time to the 18th century. Then back again three years later and after twenty years - which allowed me to go to medical school - I went back to the 1760s. The first time wasn't intentional. The other two, admittedly, were on purpose."

"We still don't have to help it along," she says dryly. She was going to come up with a few more suggestions for Claire, but is thoroughly derailed for the moment by that.

Maggie is a fiction writer, and she's fascinated. "An accidental time traveler? Is that a trait inherent to you, or something related to a place you visited or an object you found?"

"An object, I think. There's more than one of them. I don't know the name of it, but it was set up quite like Stonehenge, if you have that for reference in your world. Only when I touched a stone it somehow sent me two-hundred years into the past. I used the same stones twice more and hopefully, God willing, I'm done now."

So, the other two times weren't really an accident, but she still never meant to go in the first place.

"Did you finish up in the same time where you started, or have you decided to stay in what was once your past?" And what that does to timelines and paradoxes is absolutely fascinating to think about, actually. Time travel fiction has always been popular. It somehow doesn't surprise her that in Wonderland, she met someone who's actually done it.

"I went back to the 18th century. My husband there, I thought he'd died on the battlefield. Twenty years later, when I discovered he hadn't and was still quite possibly alive, I had to try." Claire smiles softly. "And I'm glad I did. He was alive, in Edinburgh."

Maggie smiles, determinedly squashing the part of herself that aches on hearing that. The woman she loved was alive here, in Wonderland, and vanished mere days before Maggie herself arrived. She came so close to seeing Buffy again. "I'm glad you found out, and managed to get back to him."

So am I. I just hate that all I could bring him was stories and photographs of our daughter. She agreed that she shouldn’t come, that she should stay. But I still wish he could see her, just once. I keep hoping that maybe she’ll come here, but that might be selfish, too. The things here aren’t always pleasant to go through.

[ She shouldn’t want Brianna to be here, but a selfish part of her does. ]

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