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It's fairly early in the morning when Mel, Sokka and Steph crest the final hill and find themselves looking down from the Heights towards Gotham City. Mel is keeping the girls happy in the back; Steph's driving. She doesn't ask before slowing gradually to a stop, eyes on the vista before them.

Gotham. Smoky, dark, twisted, gothic. It almost looks organic, lumpy and misshapen as it is, every building sprouting gargoyles and added wings, twisted into fantastic shapes.

It's so familiar it makes Steph's heart lurch; she hasn't been home for almost a year. She knows the skyline inside out, knows exactly how it feels to leap from the casino to the street below and swing up exactly in time to land on the train, knows where the instabilities in the gargoyles are and just how hard to throw a grapple to get from one end to the other of Ninth in under two minutes. It's filthy and ugly and disease-ridden and smoky and it's home.

Except ...

... this isn't the home she left.

It's with a sigh of pure relief that she realises, slowly, that this is Gotham before the quake, missing the light-filled spires of Luthor's redesign, all the old buildings still standing tall. This is Gotham before she had the baby, before the No Mans' Land.

This isn't her world.

The grin she turns to Sokka is enormous and full of relief.

"It's not mine. I won't find th— her here. Oh, thank fuck for that."

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Hana squeams in delight at the tickling. It makes Mel smile almost as much as the news about the lurk.

"Really? Rocketship!"

Erin flashes Mel with an amused look. That's pretty much the expression Mel had when she slammed the car on top of Icarus.

"So... Apocalyptica? That's where you ended up?"

She also casts a glance toward Sokka.

"That's where you met him?"

Making assumptions already. As a cop Erin should no better.

She really should, especially given as he looks nothing like the pale baby in Erin's hands.

The problem is, that Sokka's actually more complicated than she wants to explain to her sister, so Mel misses the false assumption completely.

"Yeah," she confirms, giving the boy in question a quick glance. "That's Sokka. And the girl is Steph. We met her in Eden, which... well, this is the third world, and we haven't given it a cute name yet."

"Mmm-hmm," Erin says appraising him from afar. "I see. Any idea on how you ended up in Apocalyptica? Or was it like me earlier today when there was just a flash of light and I was here."

"About the size of it," Mel admits. "'Scept I was being thrown off a building at the time. Nose dived into the wrong street."

Erin opens her mouth to make a comment about that before quickly shutting it again.

At this point it didn't matter why or how Mel was thrown off a rooftop. The woman standing in front of her had obviously gone through a lot of changes since then and Erin had to admit to herself she liked what she saw.

"I... I don't think I need to know the details about you on the roof," Erin said as she regretfully offered to hand Hana back. "I'm just sorry that I couldn't have been there for you somehow."

Hana almost immediately puts her hands out for Mama, and Mel takes her back quickly, even with a shrug for Erin's apology.

"There was stuff. Neither of us dealt well. Sounds like it's over for you just as much as me."

Mel's just happy to have Erin back with her.

"You call this over?" Erin said gesturing to the world around her. "Because in the last twelve hours I've dealt with some weird disease in that city over there and something big tried to eat the car. The entire car."

Mel, perhaps unexpectedly, laughs. "Well, not that bit. We just came away from a gang of bikers who tried to kill us for no reason at all. But the part where I hafta deal with how badly I screwed up at home? Dealt."

She turns back to the car again, partly to check they haven't flashed into a different world.

"We have to go on," she tells Erin. "Steph's got family in Gotham that have to be checked on."

Erin frowns at that and shakes her head. "I don't think that's a good idea. Whatever is going on in that city? We barely got out alive. Everyone seems to have gone into a coma. We tried to find anyone who might be alive but no one responded."

"Erin?" Mel says bluntly. "If this was closer to our time; if you landed somewhere where the cars were still flying and guns zapped instead of bullets, and Haddyn was right there, would you go on, or look for me?"

"I understand your friend's concern," Erin said as she crossed her arms and gave her sister a stubborn look. "But you don't appreciate the gravity of the situation. People in there are either dead or comatose."

"So we want to check that her Mom and... that her Mom's not one of them."

Mel's returned look is steady, but a stubborn frown is rising up.

"I'm me. Whatever's in there we can deal. And we have a friend who's keeping tracks to zap us out if we need it."

"I know you're you," Erin said reluctantly, "But it's dangerous in there."

Erin looked back at the cruiser and Jim ~~who she assumed was still sitting there~~.

"Look. There's a cop I rescued from the city. He probably knows the place better than your friend," Erin continued. "And the cruiser can get in and out faster than that antique over there you're driving. If you have to go in there at least use that."

"Makes sense," Mel agrees. "Think that'll take all seven of us, or do you guys want to wait?"

The argument over going she considers settled.

"What makes you think you're going?" Erin asked stubbornly.

She may not be her exact sister but protective streaks are hard to break.

Mel's face turns stubborn again.

"Because he's going with her and I'm going with him. And 'cause I'm the best fighter. We come up against something, it'll be me gets us out."

Not that Sokka and Steph aren't capable on their own, but she's her.

Erin rolled her eyes. Yes. This definitely is her sister. No matter from what timeline or world she came from.

"This isn't a gang of lurks you're going up against, Mel. It's... it's like a disease. It hits you quick and the next thing you know you're not reacting to anything," Erin argued. "What good are you going to be to your kids if you can't move?"

"You've only just met them and already using them against me?"

Mel glares at her sister - because timeline or not, this is definitely her - over Hana's oblivious head.

"I quit giving up a long time ago," she says, an edge working its way in. "I couldn't let them go without me if I wanted to."

Erin pinched the bridge of her nose as she heaved a mighty sigh. "Jesu. Mel, I'm just trying to look out for everyone," Erin said trying to clamp down on her frustration. "We're talking about going into a city that's for all intents and purposes-"

Erin looked over at Mel's friends and dropped her voice so that only Mel could hear.

"Dead. And I mean that, Mel. I was only in there for a few minutes and all I wanted to do was lie down and die."

"You found your new cop friend," Mel snaps. "Weren't even looking for him, right?"

"I was lucky. He was lucky," Erin snapped back. "And do you think we didn't try to find people alive in there? It's a bunch of bodies lying on the streets!"

When Hana starts to fuss, Mel just pulls her closer to her chest.

"Every street? You check every building? Jesu, Erin, this is family I'm talking about."

Her family, almost.

Erin bit her tongue and swallowed the snarky comment she almost made. Getting Mel riled up wasn't going to solve anything.

"Fine," she said sternly."But let's not endanger everyone. I have comms in the cruiser that we can use to remain in contact with everyone. First sign of anyone getting cold or giving up? Your zappy friend there does her zappy thing and gets people out of there."

"Right," Mel confirms, now rocking Hana slightly. "We stay in the vehicle, we keep alert, and we keep an eye on each other. But we have to do this, Erin."

That last sentence was toned almost like an apology.