A/N: Hello there, to the reader! I guess something about the 'creative' title and fabulous (note the sarcasm) summary must have attracted you to my story here! I'm not sure what else to say in the first author's note... other than that I hope you enjoy it :)
And here's the official 'by-the-book' disclaimer, I'll try to make the future ones more fun ;)
Disclaimer: I do not own anything affiliated with the x-men universe -be it comics or movies. Anything you recognize, including the title 'Time In A Bottle' (which derives from the song of the same name, preformed by Jim Croce) I do not own. So please don't sue me.
2017 Edit: fixed a lot of sentences/grammar/some spelling. ...God I used so much passive voice back then...
Prologue Part 1/Chapter 1
Paris, France
It had been raining for days now. The pools of water which started out as puddles were now miniature lakes. People rushed from shack to shack, alley to alley. Horses pulled their rickety carts through the muddy streets. This was the Banlieu, one of the poorest districts in Paris. The place that thieves, murderers, vagabonds, and more often than not: orphans, called their home. (And it was usually the orphans who took on those previous roles.) Here were the highest crime, thievery, and murder rates in the city. (That is, if such rates had existed back then.)
There was one rule: survive.
But one small child had failed to do so.
She died in a side-street, unbeknownst to all but her sister.
The sister was a mere five years old, three years younger than her dead sibling. In her archaic French she pleaded, "Please Danielle! Please wake up!" She beat her tiny fists against the unmoving chest. "Come on! You cannot leave! I'm scared of being alone!" She sobbed, more tears than raindrops staining her pale cheeks. (If that was even possible in the current state of weather.)
Danielle had been trampled to death by a horse pulling a stagecoach. No one had paid attention as the life had been crushed out of her. All the passers-by had stayed true to their namesake: they just kept on walking. That sort of thing happened occasionally; no one really cared anymore.
No one had cared as the tiny girl had pushed through the throngs of people to pull her sister's broken body from the muddy tracks, screaming in grief all the while.
No one had cared as she dragged her limp corpse away from the prying eyes of the world.
The darkened alley: which was where they were now.
Danielle had been able to glimpse bits and pieces of the future, but she hadn't seen this. How had she not seen this coming?
The still-breathing sibling rested back on her haunches. But her momentary lapse of peace was broken by a sharp pain attacking her skull. She grabbed the sides of her head and gasped as the pain proceeded to carve out pieces of her mind. At least, that's what she thought it felt like.
The girl's headache increased. Lightning flashed across the sky. Sparks flew across her body. Her vision turned into a bright white glare.
She looked to the heavens and murmured "I'm sorry Danielle."
And then, in a brilliant flare of light: she disappeared.
Brooklyn General Hospital, New York.
"The patient is going into shock ma'am!"
"I am aware of that Nurse Greyson."
"She's also freezing up! Her skin's practically blue!"
"Also aware of that Nurse Greyson. She has hypothermia; it's common for those in her case." They turned the gurney around a corner, wheels squealing down the hall. "Where did the man say he found her?'
"In an alleyway, ma'am."
"And he said that he found her exactly like this?"
"Yes ma'am, completely naked…"
Twenty-five minutes earlier…
It was beginning to rain in the streets of Brooklyn; within minutes it was a full-scale downpour. Timothy Walker cursed at his own ignorance to not have brought his raincoat. One never really knows when it could rain here.
Lightning spread across the overcast sky.
And then suddenly: CRACK! The Jensen's mailbox was no more than a piece of twisted metal on top of a scorch mark.
"Shit!" Timothy cursed. "Oh shit, shit, shit, shit, shit!" That had been a close one!
He turned down a rarely-traveled shortcut and began to run. But he barely made it half-way through before the alley was momentarily bathed in an all-consuming flare of bright white light.
"Aghh!" he cried, "my eyes!"
When the light cleared the alley seemed perfectly fine, save for a few wayward sparks of electricity. Timothy turned in a full circle, surveying his surroundings. Everything seemed all right… He brushed off his soaked trousers and sodden jacket and turned to leave. But he stopped when a groan sounded out from behind a dumpster.
The groan had emitted from the blue lips of a little girl.
"Oh god," Timothy murmured. "This is just not my day. Oh jeez, what do I do?" He noticed that she didn't have any clothes on, and that her body was turning a pale blue colour.
Timothy let out a few more 'oh gods' and crouched down next to her shivering, barely-conscious form. He shed his jacket and wrapped it around her body. What to do next? What to do? What do I do?
She's freezing you idiot! The voice of reason screamed to himself. And probably dying too! Get her to a hospital!
He sprinted down the road in which he hoped was the right direction.
Present Time
"So how is my favourite Jane Doe doing?"
Doctor Jemma Harris was the first female to ever practice at the Brooklyn General Hospital. She had worked harder than anyone else to get to where she was, and she was enjoying every minute of her superiority.
She'd had all sorts of cases in her seven years there: from a man who'd almost died from an overdose to a common condiment; to a woman who'd had a toothpick stuck in an unlikely orifice—but never a comatose child, found in an alleyway with hypothermia!
The hypothermia had been probably due to the heavy rain and cold weather they'd been having for the past three days, but who knows where her clothes had gone.
There had been speculations when Timothy Walker had brought in a half-frozen, clothe-less, little girl. But they had been pushed aside as her gurney was taken into the ER.
"Alright Jane, I'm just going to take a small blood sample." Doctor Harris liked to talk to her patients, it always seemed to reassure them, and her. Even if they were unconscious, she felt far better if she knew the patient was at least semi-aware of what she was doing.
Doctor Harris took the blood she needed, updated the log connected to the end of the bed, tucked the sheets up to the girl's chest, and exited the ward.
About twenty minutes later, the girl woke up.
Beep-beep-beep-beep-beep-beep-beep!
The heart monitor beeped erratically. The girl started up into a sitting position, gasping for breath.
Where am I? What is this place? Where's Danielle? My sister… Where is my sister?
She looked to her right arm to see something inserted into it. That something was connected to a tube and the tube was attached to a sack filled with a clear liquid. But it couldn't be water… If it was water, why are they putting it into my arm? The interior of the human body is mostly composed of water—how did she know that?
All this information, all these facts, and the memories! She was only five years old! Wait a minute! Five. She cornered that single fact. Five years old. Her birthday was November sixth, 1342. Wait, what..? It had been 1347 when she was last conscious… But this most certainly was not 1347. Where am I? And what year is it, if not the time I was last in? Everything was too clean… Much too clean for a Parisian pharmacy!
Nora
Was that her name?
Nora. She thought it again and again. She focused on that single word. Isolated everything else and thought of only that word. Her name: Nora.
She remembered it, engraving it to her memory.
There. Now that that was taken care of, she had to get out of this strange prison. Then she'd find out just where she was, and more importantly: when.
Nora ripped the IV out of her arm. IV? What's an IV? Never mind that! Just focus on the task at hand. Just get the hell out of here.
She swung her legs over the side of the bed and placed her feet on the cool, laminate floor. Laminate? What the—Forget it! Just get out of here! She pushed all of the strange thoughts to the very back of her consciousness and moved along.
Nora tried to walk, but her scrawny legs gave out and she stumbled forward, knocking a lamp off of the bedside table in the process. It fell to the floor, the glass shattering into a dozen sharp pieces.
The door opened.
"Hello?" someone said. A woman's voice.
Nora gingerly picked up a piece of glass. She rose to her feet and faced the person. They were a nurse.
Nurse Greyson took a step back, surveying the scene in front of her.
It certainly was an odd sight: a scrawny kid with a bedraggled head of curls.
Then she noticed the blood. There wasn't much, but the red splotches stood out shockingly against the white hospital gown.
She saw that the lamp had fallen over. "Oh you poor thing," she cooed. "Does it hurt?" She must have cut her hand on a shard of glass.
"Stay back!" Nora cried, brandishing her makeshift weapon.
The nurse advanced towards her, "It's alright little girl! I'm not going to hurt you." She took another step forward. Nora only had seconds.
"What year is it?"
"What?" The nurse shuffled a little more discretely across the clean hospital floor.
"I said, what year is it?" Another step; she seems to be talking quite well, for someone so young, Nurse Greyson couldn't help but wonder.
Nora raised her hand: prepared to lash out.
Nurse Greyson stopped and raised her hands in the universal 'whoa nelly' gesture. She needed to calm the kid down, with that sharp-looking weapon in her hand, she could be dangerous.
"Why," she questioned, "Of all the things to ask… do you want to know the year?"
"Just answer me!" Nora screamed, she couldn't hold it back. She needed to get out of here. She needed to get home, and the woman was the only thing in her way.
Without any warning, she reeled her hand back, loosened her grip, and flung the glass in the Nurse's direction.
Time slowed down, literally, and as the deadly fragment of glass flew through the air, several things happened at once.
The door opened even wider to reveal the doctor, who was at first very confused at the current situation. But in the second of Doctor Harris' hesitation, her confusion became a sudden realization as to what was going on.
Nurse Greyson's mouth opened in shock as the glass punctured her throat. And Nora shakily walked over to the falling body of the nurse.
The odd thing was: she was moving at a normal speed, while everything else happened in slow motion.
Then everything resumed its normal pace.
Nurse Greyson collapsed against the wall behind her, smearing blood across it. The Doctor let out a shriek and fell down next to her, screaming out her name. "Erin! Erin!" She tried to stop the bleeding, but there was too much of it.
Nora stumbled forward in shock. She didn't know what had happened. She didn't know what had made her throw it. "I'm so sorry," she blubbered. "I didn't mean to!"
The situation seemed so similar. What had felt like moments ago, she'd caused her sister's death. And now someone else's blood was on her hands.
Hands trembling, Doctor Harris turned on her.
"You." she spat, "you did this!" She tried to grab Nora but she ducked under the Doctor's reach with a surprising swiftness. Doctor Harris tripped and fell to the floor.
Nora crouched down to the Nurse's shaking body.
"Don't you dare touch her!"
Nurse Greyson muttered something unintelligible.
"What?" Nora asked.
"The year…" She murmured, "the year… is… 1961."
"Thank you," Nora responded, feeling way too calm for a moment like this.
But as Nora turned to get up, her hand brushed against the Nurse's bare arm.
Through that first contact, Nora's mind was bombarded with an onslaught of memories and thoughts—none of which were her's.
Twisty birthday candles—whatever those were—pink ribbons in her hair; a cute boy next door; a caring family. All of those memories… of a life that was never her's.
And the knowledge. From the current President (John F Kennedy), to the colours of the rainbow (ROY G BIV), to the difference between a ionic and covalent bond. (Something about metals and non-metals…)
She tried to push everything back, but it was too much. The memories she shouldn't be seeing, the things she wasn't supposed to know, the pain that the nurse had felt just seconds ago: it was crushing her skull.
Nora's scrawny frame crumpled against the bloodstained wall. Her last sight was of a score of people crowding the room, and of Doctor Harris screaming at her, trying to claw her way towards Nora.
The floor fell from under her and everything went black.
