Disclaimer: I only own William and the plot.

A/N: Oh my. I cannot believe it's been so long since I've updated! I feel like the worst fanfic writer ever. Here is an update, for those of you who are waiting for it!

"Mommy!" a little voice reached Phil's ears early the next morning. "Mommy! I wan' out!" Phil blearily rubbed his eyes with one hand, then looking at his watch, finding that it was six in the morning. He recognized the voice as Williams. Then again, who else in the house would be calling out 'mommy' at six in the morning? He glanced to his right, where said woman lay asleep, curled up next to him on the couch they'd fallen asleep on. If the bags under her eyes were any indication, it didn't seem as though she'd gotten much sleep lately. He opted not to wake her up.

He carefully disentangled himself from the blanket that lay over both of them, careful not to wake up Keely, before padding up the stairs. Following the increasingly plaintive cries from the little boy, Phil finally managed to find his way back to the nursery. William was standing up, hanging over the edge of the wooden crib, one hand grasping the rail with a death grip, while standing on his teddy bear and swinging his leg over the rail, a few feet down from his hand. A shocked look crossed his face when Phil walked in. He froze in his actions, before hastily letting go of the crib rail and falling with a plop onto his diapered bottom.

"Da!" he shrieked after a moment. He stood back up, and reached out his arms to be lifted out of his wooden confines.

"Early riser, huh?" Phil asked, picking up the toddler and tousling his hair. William gave a toothy grin, revealing several spots where baby teeth had not come down all the way just yet, as if to say Six isn't early, what are you talking about?! The little boy wiggled to get down, nearly flipping himself over backwards in order to do so. Phil quickly released him, and watched the little boy dash down the hallway. He plopped down on his bottom on the top stair, before shuffling down them in a sitting position. Phil followed close behind, not sure if William could actually climb stairs by himself just yet.

William popped up from the bottom stair energetically, before scrambling in socked feet over to where his mother sat, still asleep, on the couch. Phil hurried over and caught him in mid-air, as he went to pounce on his mother. William let out a cry of indignation, kicking his feet back and forth as his father hugged him to him.

"Let's let Mommy sleep a little longer, okay?" he asked the toddler, still finding the word Mommy a little foreign in his mouth, especially connected to Keely. It was even harder to connect the word Daddy with himself, even if the evidence was trying extremely hard to break away from his grasp as he spoke.

"No!" William shrieked as Phil quickly carried him into the kitchen, out of earshot of Keely. William was dangerously close to having a temper tantrum, even Phil could tell that. Spying a high chair sitting in the corner, Phil dragged it over to the small island in the middle of the kitchen. Swiftly, he deposited the toddler into it, and spread a layer of Cheerios on the tray from the container on the counter. William's fussing stopped immediately as he reached for a piece of cereal, painstakingly picking up one piece at a time and carefully bringing it up to his mouth.

"Better?" Phil was thankful for his reflexes. All that time playing laser squash had really helped, if only for keeping a two-year-old quiet. William held out a Cheerio to him in response.

"Cheerwio?" he asked, with that adorable lisp he'd acquired as he began to talk. While his pediatrician was concerned, most people just found it endearing, and Keely had learned to hang onto it as much as she could, as he was rapidly growing out of it and his precious baby clothes.

"Thanks," Phil smiled, took the cereal and popped it into his mouth. "Yum." William giggled, showing quite a few teeth while he was at it. He grabbed a spoon that lay forgotten on the counter a few inches away from him and attempted to scoop the Cheerios into his mouth, with maybe twenty percent accuracy. He pushed his father away as he tried to help, content to let over half the cereal go crashing back down onto the tray. Phil was convinced he did it because he liked to hear the cereal plink down onto the plastic high-chair tray. In the end, William got bored with the spoon and flung it away onto the floor, lifting his hands to try and dislodge several pieces of cereal that had gotten stuck to his hair.

"You're nuts," Phil laughed, picking a few Cheerios off of William's head. "You're supposed to eat the cereal, not wear it."

"Cheerwios?"

"Yes, you're supposed to eat the Cheerios," Phil ruffled the toddler's hair. William grinned from ear to ear before turning towards the door and crying out, "Mommy!"

"Good morning, William," Keely walked over from where she stood leaning against the doorframe and placing a kiss on William's forehead.

"Mommy, Cheerwio?" he extended one of the few that remained on his tray to her.

"No, thank you," Keely smiled and sat down next to Phil, giving him a wide smile. "Good morning."

"Good morning to you too," he said, pulling her onto his lap and giving her a kiss. William giggled from his high chair. Keely rolled her eyes and playfully flicked a Cheerio at him. William grabbed a handful to throw back at her, but before he could, Keely had scooped him up out of his chair.

"Okay, when the tossing of cereal starts, that means breakfast is over," she laughed, tickling William's stomach. William gave her an adorable ear-to-ear grin, and even Phil could see he was trying to get on her good side. "What do you say we go get some day clothes on, buddy?" He nodded.

"Bye!" he said to Phil, and gave a movie-actress style kiss "Mwah!"

"Hey, he's not going anywhere," Keely laughed, tousling his hair and walking up the stairs.

Phil, unsure of what to do with himself, cleared the leftover Cheerios and cereal dust off the high chair tray and surrounding floor space. When he was done, he rinsed off the sponge he'd been using and returned it to the edge of the sink. Turning around, he found that he was not alone in the kitchen...Keely's mother had apparently been awoken by the ruckus and had made her way down the stairs. And now, there she stood, looking quite formidable in her bathrobe. Her hair stood up wildly, and the curlers which had been tightly placed last night were now loose, making her look even more terrifying.

"Good morning," he said, trying to smile. He hadn't though about her mother's reaction to his return.

"Good morning, Phil," she replied, with an edge of malice in her voice. She walked over to the coffee maker and grabbed the pot, pouring water into it from the sink. Phil watched her make coffee in silence, not knowing what the right thing to say was. I'm sorry I abandoned your daughter, but it was all the government's fault I was gone? Or I'm from the future and was sent back to realign the timeline? He could just imagine her phoning the psych ward at Pickford Memorial Hospital and requesting an emergency team of psychiatrists. He fiddled with the ring on his finger, turning it around and around. When she was finished, she flicked the switch on the side, and then turned to acknowledge him.

"I'm not going to pretend to be overjoyed that you're back," she said, cutting through the silence like a knife. "I'm not as accepting as my daughter is, and you've had her wrapped around your finger since she met you."

"I—"

"No, you're going to sit there and listen. You just left her. Alone! And with a baby! You're lucky I don't flay you alive for that. And then to find out you were married! That you eloped! Phil, I had come to like you as Keely's boyfriend, but now..." She shook her head and pursed her lips.

"William needs a father. He's been relying on that Owen person since he was a baby, and let me tell you, he's not at all the right person for the job. If you hurt her again, I will make sure you're ripped apart. In fact, I'll do it myself. I love the two of them more than life itself, and I can't bear for Keely to go through any more sadness. Got it?" she walked up to him and poked him the chest with a manicured nail to punctuate her last statement. "And I'm not going to ask you any questions about where you've been; you'd probably lie to me like Keely's been doing for the past three years. Just remember what I said." She gave him a withering look before stalking back over to the coffee maker. Phil blinked a few times in amazement, then snuck out of the kitchen and up the stairs.

"Okay, let's try again," he heard Keely's voice from down the hall. "A, B, C, D..."

"A, B, C, D..." William sang back to her in his little toddler voice. He got all the way up to K, and Phil couldn't help but smile as he heard William run the letters L, M, N, O, and P together as one word. He finally gave up at T, not able to remember what the other letters were, and instead throwing in nonsense letters in as substitutes. Phil heard Keely laugh before starting the song over again, trying to get him to join in.

"Hey, we're almost ready," she said, seeing Phil standing the doorway. William was sitting on the changing table, trying to figure out how to work the twist top on the bottle of baby powder. Keely took it from him and fastened the hooks on the denim overalls he was wearing.

"I don't think your mom likes me very much," Phil laughed, walking in to keep William occupied while his mother attempted to put sneakers on his wriggling feet.

"Yeah, I had a feeling she'd corner you in the kitchen," Keely said, adding a second knot to William's laces and starting in the second shoe. "She's just so protective of us. Especially after the scare I had with William, she—"

"What scare with William?"

"Placental abruption. The placenta separates from the wall of the uterus and bleeds from the place it used to be attached. Usually that blood is expelled out of the woman's body. But sometimes, it gets caught behind the placenta and pools there," she said, finishing her tying and setting William on the floor. He ran off to play with some blocks he'd dumped on the floor. Keely leaned against the changing table to explain the rest. "William being my first, I didn't know the warning signs. About two months before he was supposed to be born, my body went into shock and started to hemorrhage. The doctor said I'd almost died. William, too." She looked fondly towards her son, who smiled and waved a block at her. "Anyway, ever since then, Mom's been really protective of us. I guess that really opened her eyes."

"Wow," Phil was taken aback. He'd never known there were risks involved with pregnancy. Then again, he didn't have much experience in that area. He grabbed her hand and tugged her into his arms. What would he have done if she'd died? William, too? Not to mention that he would have had no idea, about the baby, or their deaths. Research about persons of the past was highly classified information in the future.

"Da!" Phil felt a little tug on his jeans, and looked down to find William lifting his hands to him. "Up!"

"Alright," he laughed, and swung the toddler up to rest on his hip. "Impatient little thing, aren't you?" He was surprised the boy had taken to him so quickly.

"He's always been that way," Keely smiled, tickling William under the chin. "His doctor says it's just a phase, but if it's been going on since the day he was born, does it really count as a phase?"

"Hmm...I wonder where he gets it from?" Phil pretended to think really hard, making such a hilarious face that William burst into hysterical laughter.

"Funny," Keely rolled her eyes. It seemed that three years hadn't changed his sense of humor much. Though, it had changed his physique, and she wasn't too jaded to notice. "What do you say we go to the park? I told William yesterday we'd go; he loves the tunnels, and this is supposed to be the last clear day of the week. They predict rain until mid-week."

"Sounds good to me," Phil said, tossing the toddler up in the air, earning him a you're-going-to-kill him squeak from Keely and laughter from William.

Half-an-hour later, after three checks of the diaper bag, two diaper checks and one temper tantrum, the newly reunited family found themselves at the park. William was straining at the restraints of his stroller so much that Phil was sure they were going to snap any minute, or that the toddler would cut himself in two. He was on the brink of another temper tantrum as Keely undid the clasp and lifted him out. He wriggled to get down, and as soon as he was placed on his feet, he zoomed off in the direction of the sandbox.

"Remember, William, the sand goes in the sandbox, not in our mouths!" Keely called after him. William took no notice of her, scrambling over the wooden edge of the box, nearly knocking his little red baseball cap his mother had insisted on having him wear clear off his head. However, Phil did notice that not a grain of sand entered his mouth as he happily built an imaginary world out of sand. He and Keely made their way over to the swings, happy to bypass the middle-aged parents who tended to sit on the benches near the jungle gym, exclaiming how smart little Johnny was, or how Emma had just learned to brush her teeth...all by herself!

"Remember when we used to come here?" Phil asked, taking hold of the chains and kicking the ground slightly to get the swing moving. Keely smiled, keeping one eye on William as she answered.

"Of course. However, I do believe it was a bit darker when we used to meet here,"

"And there weren't many kids around,"

"Unless you count the drug dealers over in the far corner,"

"Oh, yes, those," Phil and Keely lapsed into silence, this one quite a bit more comfortable than the one the previous night. William waved to them from his place in the sandbox, letting go a huge handful of sand to fall all over him.

"So," Phil said after a moment. "What's William like?"

"Hmmm?"

"Well, I mean, he's two...he's got to have some personality,"

"Yeah, he's had a personality since the day he was born," Keely said, a bit sarcastically as she remembered William's stubborn streak. Phil chuckled. "Well, he's incredibly stubborn, and impatient, which you've probably already gathered. But he's also incredibly sweet, though he has a bad temper. He doesn't talk that much, though when he does it's straight to the point. Right now, he loves trucks and dinosaurs. Hence why we've got a million toy trucks lying around the house."

"I noticed that,"

"I'm convinced he gets out of his crib in the middle of the night and plays with them; they tend to migrate around the house after they've been put away,"

"Well, he seems pretty adept at getting out of his crib; he was halfway out of the thing when I walked in this morning,"

"I don't think he's ever really climbed out of it...at least, I hope not," Keely's face went a little white, and Phil could tell she was concocting all sorts of what-if situations, if perchance William ever did manage to climb out of his crib. Phil waved a hand in front of her face. She snapped out of it and looked at him.

"I wonder what Owen and Via will say when they see you,"

"I hope it's nothing like your mother's reaction,"

"It won't be. They're much more understanding. At least, Via is. Owen's kind of proclaimed himself father figure to William. Not sure how he'll take being out of a job,"

"Are they together now?"

"Not yet. But so very close,"

"Of course," they lapsed into yet another comfortable silence. This was part of their relationship that Phil had missed the most; being able to be together without the need to be talking or touching. Yet the two were as close as any human beings could be. William grinned widely from the tunnels, where he had gone after tiring of the sandbox, and gave a wave. His parents waved back.

Without warning, the wind picked up a little bit, causing Keely to pull her sweater tighter around her. The sky looked harmless, and strong winds this time of year were a bit out of the ordinary, but weather was unpredictable. She contemplated calling William in, but seeing how he was having so much fun crawling through the twisting green tunnels set low to the ground, she decided against it. The weather was going to turn cold soon; he needed all the outside time he could get. Plus, it might tire him out. The wind picked up another notch.

"Keel..." Phil's voice trailed off, sounding quite worried. She looked in the direction he was, and saw the tell-tale blue vortex of a time-traveler form behind the bathrooms. A young man stumbled out, anxiously looking around the park. His eyes settled on Phil and Keely, and he started to clumsily make his way over to them. Keely could see he was clutching his side, and grimacing as though he were in pain.

"What the...?" Phil muttered, standing up and looking at the man with a mixture of curiosity and fear. He glanced over to where William was, completely unaware of the situation. The young man finally made it to the swings, leaning heavily on one of the metal support posts, breathing heavily.

Phil and Keely hesitatingly made their way over to him. While they didn't at all trust him, if he was hurt, it would be just as well to get him to a hospital. The man looked up at them, letting out a hiss of pain. His dark brown hair waved in the breeze, longer pieces on the side covering his eyes. His brown eyes had the haze of restlessness, and his skin was pale and looked clammy. His clothes were tattered; the gray sweatshirt he wore was torn to shreds, along with his jeans. His jacket was covered in mud and other stains; Phil didn't even want to know. The man removed his hand from his side to reveal a deep gash in his abdomen, which was bleeding profusely now that the pressure had been relieved and left a deep red coating on his hand. He looked up at them, his eyes imploring them.

"Mom..." he rasped out, taking a step towards them. He moved his feet as though they were made of lead. "Dad..." He let out another hiss of pain and crumpled to the ground, his unconscious face lined deep with pain and worry.

So, what did you think? Who is this guy? Why is he here? Important questions! And all shall be answered, but not in Tonight. As it is getting rather lengthy, and the original premise of the story has been fulfilled, this part of the saga will be in a sequel, aptly called Tomorrow. And I promise that will be up far faster than this update was.