Based on:

post/173515216839/can-you-write-alice-s-letter-to-robin-i-want-to

A letter from the Past that re-writes the present

The day had been a long one dragging on and on with no end in sight. What was worse was that Tilly wasn't returning any of her texts. "What's the good of having a girlfriend if I can't text her in the middle of the day on her day off?" the part-time bartender complained more to herself than anyone else grateful that everyone within hearing distance of her little outburst was too busy talking with someone else to really be listening to her.

Everyone that is but her aunt.

"You just saw her like." Roni paused looking at her watch for dramatic effect "wow almost a full hour ago." Her boss reminded her with a teasing smile as she pulled the lever on the beer tap refilling someone's glass for them.

"I know that. That's not really what I'm upset about…." Margot paused with a frustrated sigh wondering why she was still upset about this ever since that weird woman had come in talking about dead trees coming back to life and just as quickly vanished leaving Margot with a bleeding poke to her finger and a painful longing ache in her chest over her 'Almost Runway' no not her runaway Tilly was her 'Tower Girl' now and forever. Although why her mind had come up with Tilly being trapped in towers was strange in and of itself. Tilly didn't belong in a tower. She should be free to roam and run like Alice is having adventures and setting little tea parties with her favorite jam and candy apples. But it could just be that the rook was her girlfriend's favorite chess piece so her frazzled mind had just put the two together to save time.

"It's just…" Margot stammered her hands automatically reaching for the bar towel under the bar and pulled a tray of freshly rinses glasses toward her needing something to do as she arranged her thoughts while her aunt waited patiently next to her filling orders, yet her eyes never once strayed from her niece's upset expression. "Ever since business picked up at the truck with all Til's brilliant sales ideas I've hardly gotten any real time with her other than when our break line up or she's not off helping out with something at the station." The young woman confessed, "I mean I guess I'm just jealous that Rogers and to a lesser extent Weaver have gotten more time with her than I have."

Roni smiled knowingly resting a comforting hand on Margot's shoulder. "From what Rogers has been telling me even when Tilly's with him she's mostly telling him about little things the two of you have been up to." Her aunt commented, "She even says you're really coming along at your chess game." That got a much hoped for smile from the bespectacled young woman now dipping her head to hide a blush. "Tilly's a really good teacher."

Roni gave her a little laugh in answer but there was some kind of knowing understanding in her eyes in those few seconds they held Margot's "How about you take another break since the crowds thinned a bit?" If she hadn't been looking right at her she would have missed the worried look that came into her eyes as the sky outside suddenly weirdly darkened in the middle of the day.

"Everything okay?"

Roni started in surprise turning away from the now darkened window trying to steady her hand in passing Margot the book she always kept close at hand under the bar. Her treasured copy of Alice in Wonderland that she had found tucked away in her backpack one night when the bus she was on had once again broken down in the middle of a rainstorm.

"Careful," Margot growled defensively not fast enough to catch it when the second-hand book fell from her aunt's trembling fingers, so it landed tent like onto the floor between them. "I got you Alice." Margot promised picking the book up tenderly then noticing for the first time that it seemed to have something tucked between its pages like a bookmarker when the thing falls back out from the overturned book and back onto the floor.

The envelope puzzled her. Margot had read the book cover to cover several times since she'd found it hidden away in her pack and this letter certainly hadn't been in it before. No matter how familiar it might be to the world traveler. It wasn't until she had picked it up and turned it over that she realized quiet possibly how this new addition had come to be tucked into her favorite book.

It was Tilly's handwriting scrawled across the front.

"My Love"

Margot's heart beat a little faster as she read over the words again and again as she tripped her way over toward an empty table and away from her aunt who was now in a heated whispered conversation with that Lucy the kid who'd been hanging around more and more of late.

Her hands were trembling worse than Roni's had been moments earlier as she opened the letter and carefully unfolded the letter inside.

Reading over her girlfriend's well thought out yet hastily written words quietly giggling over how very much like Alice every syllable of the note sounded- even the crossed out bits- in that little corner of the trembling bar triggered something deeply buried in Margot's mind. It was as if this letter wasn't just a love confession from the woman she herself loved but it was a link to something else…. No, it was a link to someone else that Margot had somehow forgotten.

Herself.

The longer she re-read Tilly's words the hazier flashes of memories of what Alice was writing about flashed in Margot's mind.

'Don't Move Spy'

'You're Alice…. Nook's kid.'

"Kind of New here names Robin."

'New Robin…So Nobin?'

"I've been lodes of places and this cage least favorite in all the realms"

"Seriously Tower Girl?"

'I escaped these walls but I'm still bloody trapped'

"It's from one of my adventures in Wonderland"

'I once outran a Bandersnatch'

"Did you not hear me? I said leave her alone"

"We'll Always know eachother…. even when we don't'

Robin's hands slammed palms down on top of the table clawing at the side of it needing something less breakable than Alice's letter to hold on to as her mind was overwhelmed yet again with more flashes of her life. Both as Margot and as Robin but always with that one woman who made life worth living….

A strong-gripping hand clamping down on her shoulder brought the reeling archer back to the world outside her clearing mind her eyes casting around until they landed on the dull gray of her true love's father.

"We need your help love. More to the point Tilly needs your help." Nook explained just as the ground under their feet shook again in another wave of unnatural force.

Another curse.

And her Alice was caught in the crossfire yet again.

"Lead the way detective," Robin ordered her unwavering gaze seeming to surprise the man before her while at his side Rumpelstiltskin was looking at her with an all too familiar impish gaze of his own. "Let's go get our girl back." The archer exclaimed pushing past them out into the darkened street.

"Hang on Alice. I'm on my way."